Transactions, transgressions, transformations : American culture in Western Europe and Japan / edited by Heide Fehrenbach and Uta G. Poiger.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Fehrenbach, Heide, editor.

Poiger, Uta G., 1965- editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Popular culture--United States.

Popular culture.

Popular culture--Europe.

Popular culture--Japan.

Europe--Civilization--American influences.

Europe.

Japan--Civilization--American influences.

Japan.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xl, 258 p. ) ill. ;

Place of Publication:

New York ; Oxford : Berghahn Books, 2000.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

American culture has been one of the most controversial exports of the United States: greeted with enthusiasm by some, with hostility by others. Yet, few societies escape its influence. However, not all changes should be interpreted simply as "Americanization." The shaping of the postwar world has been much more complex than this term implies as is shown in this volume that explores the links between Americanization and modernity in Western Europe and Japan. In considering the impact of products and images ranging from movies and music to fashion and architecture, a multi-disciplinary group of contributors asks how American culture has been employed internationally in the articulation of postwar identities - be they national or subnational,socially sanctioned or socially transgressive. Their essays on France, Italy, Germany and Japan move beyond the simple paradigms of colonization and democratic modernization, yet retain a sensitivity to the asymmetries in the postwar power relationships between these countries and the United States. An extensive introduction historically locates changing interpretations of American influences abroad and suggests the problems and promises of "Americanization" as an analytical tool. Its comparative focus and interdisciplinary scope will appeal to a wide range of students and scholars of cold war and post-cold war history.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS

INTRODUCTION Americanization Reconsidered

Part I TWENTIETH-CENTURY MODERNITIES

1. America in the German Imagination

2. Comparative Anti-Americanism in Western Europe

3. Surface above All? American Influence on Japanese Urban Space

Part II DRAWING CULTURAL BOUNDARIES, FORGING THE NATIONAL

4. Persistent Myths of Americanization: German Reconstruction and the Renationalization of Postwar Cinema, 1945–1965

5. No More Song and Dance: French Radio Broadcast Quotas, Chansons, and Cultural Exceptions

Part III TRANSNATIONAL STYLINGS: AMERICAN MUSIC AND THE POLITICS OF IDENTITY

6. American Music, Cold War Liberalism, and German Identities

7. Jukebox Boys: Postwar Italian Music and the Culture of Covering

8. The Social Production of Difference: Imitation and and Authenticity in Japanese Rap Music

Part IV DE-ESSENTIALIZING “AMERICA” AND THE “NATIVE”

9. Learning from America: Postwar Urban Recovery in West Germany

10. The French Cinema and Hollywood: A Case Study of Americanization

11. Waiting for Godzilla: Chaotic Negotiations between Post-Orientalism and Hyper-Occidentalism

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (pages [237]-246) and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781785330049

1785330047

9781571811073

1571811079

OCLC:

1053755674