Nostalgia

Day 2
Dr Will Kurlinkus
Communities of Nostalgia
1. God memories: Simplified prelapsarian longings (“natural,” “slow,”
“American,”) that define the authentic core (the home) of the
community of nostalgia. These moments are bowdlerized and depicted
as stable (even when they aren’t, think the Constitution, the
environment) to oppose the chaos of the present.
2. A loss or threat: there’s always some chaotic disruption the nostalgic is
fighting against.
3. A nostalgic crux. The outsider (almost always an envoy of “the new”)
that’s blamed for the loss. From immigrants, to protesters, to
corporations, this group of outsiders bears the brunt of the nostalgic
critique and redesign effort. If this outsider can be overcome we will be
restored.
4. Future-oriented hope. As signified by verbs like “regain,” “rediscover,”
“again,” nostalgic rhetoric always involves some real hope that god
memories—through true restoration, the salvage of an ethic, or a slightly
ironic stance—might be recovered
1. Choose a community of
nostalgia (it can be one we
read about for today) and
analyze it according to our
nostalgic rhetoric.
2. What are the
mechanisms—the artifacts,
technologies, media that
encourage your community
to long in the way it does?
How are the mechanisms
endowed with power? How
are they interactive?
3. How might the ideals of this
community design a sci-fi future? That is,
what changes in the world does this
community want and what would the
world look like if this community got what
it wanted? Stick with one aspect of
culture (changes in music, architecture,
technology, fashion, food).