The aesthetics of nostalgia TV : production design and the boomer era / Alex Bevan.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bevan, Alex, 1982- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Nostalgia on television.

Television programs--Social aspects--United States.

Television programs.

Television programs--United States--History--21st century.

Television programs--Social aspects.

History.

United States.

Physical Description:

xvi, 245 pages : illustrations (black and white) ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

New York : Bloomsbury Academic, 2019.

Summary:

The Aesthetics of Nostalgia TV explores the aesthetic politics of nostalgia for 1950s and 60s America on contemporary television. Specifically, it looks at how nostalgic TV production design shapes and is shaped by larger historical discourses on gender and technological change, and America's perceived decline as a global power. Alex Bevan argues that the aesthetics of nostalgic TV tell stories of their own about historical decline and progress, and the place of the baby boomer television suburb in American national memory. She contests theories on nostalgia that see it as stagnating, regressive or a reversion to outdated gender and racial politics, and the technophobic longing for a bygone era; and, instead, argues nostalgia is an important form of historical memory and vehicle for negotiating periods of historical transition. The book addresses how and why the shows construct the boomer era as a placeholder for gender, racial, technological and declensionist discourses of the present. The book uses Mad Men (AMC, 2007), Ugly Betty (ABC, 2006-2010), Desperate Housewives (ABC, 2004-2012) and film remakes of 1950s and 60s family sitcoms as primary case studies.

Contents:

Introduction: Touring the Mad Men set

Part I: Sets. Chapter 1: TV suburbia and remembering the sitcom set

Chapter 2: Office sets and nostalgic modernism in the TV workplace

Part II: Props. Chapter 3: Prop talk: a behind the scenes look

Chapter 4: Prop stories: media props in narrative context

Part III: Costumes. Chapter 5: Making, renting, and telling histories through costume

Chapter 6: Costume countermemory: marginalized television voices and Chicana retro

Conclusion: Nostalgic failure.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 218-237) and index.

ISBN:

9781501331411

1501331418

OCLC:

1079342529