Call Number: Stacks E169.12 .K56 2004
Recommended by: Rus Springer
In this collection of essays Chuck Klosterman explores popular culture as experienced by people coming of age in the 1980s and 1990s. For the rest of us, he gives insight into the ways in which who we are in reality is often only a reflection of who we are in popular culture.
Along the way he touches upon how, ultimately, no one is able to find real love because of John Cusack; how the Real World changed from being a sample of the youth of America to unintentionally creating the youth of America; the realization that Pamela Anderson, like Marilyn Monroe before her, is the sex symbol for our time largely because times change; that the 1980s rivalry between the Celtics and the Lakers represents not just race in American but “absolutely everything” about America; the fact that Saved by the Bell is an explanation of all things Generation X; and the relationships between the apocalyptic, Christian theology of the Left Behind series and NFL football and “America’s insipid Oprah Culture”—plus much more.
His irreverent and uniquely skewed take on such things may produce a chuckle but, ultimately, he delivers the ideal in criticism: it is less about a specific artifact and more about the culture itself.
