Gatsby’s Defeat and America’s Status Quo
Gatsby’s fictional legacy is a reflection of America’s all-too-real, relentless ambition, its bottomless hunger for reinvention, and its cruelty toward those who will never reach the upper class.
consumerism
Guns N’ Roses’ Dragged High Art Through Primal Sleaze for ‘Appetite for Destruction’
The coiled intelligence and emotional impact of Guns N’ Roses’ Appetite for Destruction insists that humanity’s ugly reality is better than hypocrisy or quiescence.
Is the ‘Barbie’ Movie Performative Subversion or Meaningful Rebellion?
Is the Barbie movie, like the Barbie dolls, a superficial attempt to co-opt feminist discourse? Or does it offer something substantial?
‘The Zone of Interest’ and Our Modern Day Comforts
Can The Zone of Interest, a film about a Nazi commandant and his family, have something to say about the modern day comforts so many enjoy?
What Puts the Pop in Pop Music?
As the Beatles learned, good music, even good looks, is seldom enough to break a band into the American mainstream. So what puts the pop in pop music?
COVID-19 and Our Purgatory of Consumerism
Our pandemic quarantine has become the sublime enactment of Baudrillard's theory of consumption – that modern consumption, with its myth of individual liberty and choice, is in fact 'de-socialising'.
‘Clutter’ Gets in Your Head
In Jennifer Howard's social history, Clutter, the emotional relationship to the material world is critical in trying to understand her mother's hoarding behaviors.
Nazis, Nostalgia, and Critique in Taika Waititi’s ‘Jojo Rabbit’
Arriving amidst the exhaustion of the past (21st century cultural stagnation), Waititi locates a new potential object for the nostalgic gaze with Jojo Rabbit: unpleasant and traumatic events themselves.
When Chicago Became a Shoppers’ Paradise for Women, Men Had to Step Aside
Creating a culture of consumption in 20th century Chicago meant making space for shoppers, which meant integrating women into public life, in a downtown dominated by men. Historian Emily Remus revels in the ramifications of that cultural shift in A Shoppers' Paradise.
Quit Dreaming: Quasi-Feminism in Nike’s Women’s Soccer “Dream Further” Ad
Women with economic privilege are positioned to celebrate Nike's "Dream Further" ad as progress while ignoring their complicity in the exploitation of other women.
‘Burger’ (Object Lessons) Speaks Volumes About American Consumption
As Bill Clinton and Donald Trump have illustrated, how you absorb burgers says everything about how you can, or should, lead a nation.
In ‘Downsizing’ Shrinking Means Big Money and Bigger Problems
Being the size of a dog's chew toy might not be to everybody's taste, but it's certainly a shortcut to a kind of upper middle-class luxury unobtainable for most of humanity.