There is no time like the past Retro between memory and materiality in contemporary culture Handberg, Kristian Publication date: 2014 Document version Early version, also known as pre-print Citation for published version (APA): Handberg, K. (2014). There is no time like the past: Retro between memory and materiality in contemporary culture. Det Humanistiske Fakultet, Københavns Universitet. Download date: 26. Sep. 2021 FACULTY OF HUMANITIES UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN PhD thesis Kristian Handberg There’s no time like the past Retro between memory and materiality in contemporary culture Academic advisor: Mette Sandbye Submitted: 09/05/2014 Institutnavn: Institut for Kunst og Kulturvidenskab Name of department: Department of Arts and Cultural Studies Author: Kristian Handberg Titel og evt. undertitel: There´s no time like the past Title / Subtitle: Retro between memory and materiality in contemporary culture Subject description: A study of retro in contemporary culture as cultural memory through analyses of site-specific contexts of Montreal and Berlin. Academic advisor: Mette Sandbye, lektor, Institut for Kunst og Kulturvidenskab, Københavns Universitet. Co-advisor: Will Straw, Professor, McGill University, Montreal, Canada. Submitted: May 2014 2 Contents AKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...................................................................................................... 6 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................... 7 There’s no time like the past: Presenting the project .................................................................................................... 7 The retro age .................................................................................................................................................................. 7 The project and its means: Re-reading retro .................................................................................................................. 8 The structure of the dissertation ................................................................................................................................... 11 Defining retro and its context ........................................................................................................................................ 14 Retro: suggested definitions ......................................................................................................................................... 14 Retro as objects in context ........................................................................................................................................... 18 Retro as aesthetics ........................................................................................................................................................ 20 Authenticity, irony and nostalgia .................................................................................................................................. 22 Authenticity ................................................................................................................................................................. 22 Irony ............................................................................................................................................................................. 25 Nostalgia ...................................................................................................................................................................... 27 Introduction of related sensibilities: Kitsch, camp and cult ....................................................................................... 31 Kitsch ........................................................................................................................................................................... 31 Camp ............................................................................................................................................................................ 34 Cult .............................................................................................................................................................................. 36 The study of retro ........................................................................................................................................................... 38 CHAPTER 2: STUDYING RETRO: MATERIAL AND CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES THEORY AND METHOD ................................................................................................... 41 Introduction .................................................................................................................................................................. 41 Doing with things ............................................................................................................................................................ 42 The retro object: from rubbish to riches? ..................................................................................................................... 42 Material Culture: The study of things .......................................................................................................................... 44 Things as Materializations ........................................................................................................................................... 49 The social life of things ................................................................................................................................................... 52 Bourdieu and the cultural object .................................................................................................................................. 53 Concepts of culture ......................................................................................................................................................... 57 Subculture: Resistance trough Bricolage ..................................................................................................................... 59 Post subculture? ........................................................................................................................................................... 64 Popular culture ............................................................................................................................................................. 66 Contemporary culture, identity and things .................................................................................................................. 72 Individuality and collectivity in contemporary culture ................................................................................................ 76 The retro object and its social context .......................................................................................................................... 78 Scenes .......................................................................................................................................................................... 78 Orvar Löfgren’s modern materiality ............................................................................................................................ 80 The retro object: selection and circulation ................................................................................................................... 81 Conclusion: The social life of modern things................................................................................................................ 83 3 CHAPTER 3: CULTURAL MEMORY: PASTNESS, TEMPORALITY, AND CULTURAL IDENTITY .......................................................................................................................... 85 Introduction: Retro as cultural memory ...................................................................................................................... 85 Cultural Memory Studies ............................................................................................................................................... 86 Halbwachs and the social frameworks of memory ...................................................................................................... 88 The Cultural Memory of Jan Assmann ........................................................................................................................ 90 History and memory between the canon and the archive ............................................................................................. 93 Lieu de mémoire : the objects of memory ..................................................................................................................... 95 “Present pasts”: Memory in contemporary culture .................................................................................................... 98 The things in the cultural memory: Between meaning and presence ......................................................................... 102 Conclusion: Retro and Cultural Memory ................................................................................................................... 104 CHAPTER 4: THE FRAMING OF THE FIFTIES: A READING OF THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF RETRO .......................................................................................... 106 Introduction .................................................................................................................................................................