The Argument about Things in the 1980s : Goods and Garbage in an Age of Neoliberalism / by Tim Jelfs.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Jelfs, Tim, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

American fiction--History and criticism.

American fiction.

Material culture--United States--History--20th century.

Material culture.

Consumption (Economics)--United States--History--20th century.

Consumption (Economics).

United States--Civilization--1970-.

United States.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (230 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Morgantown [West Virginia] : West Virginia University Press, 2018.

Summary:

In the late 1970s, a Jeff Koons art exhibit featured mounted vacuum cleaners lit by fluorescent tube lighting and identified by their product names: New Hoover Quik Broom, New Hoover Celebrity IV. Raymond Carver published short stories such as "Are These Actual Miles?" that cataloged the furniture, portable air conditioners, and children's bicycles in a family home. Some years later the garbage barge Mobro 4000 turned into an international scandal as it spent months at sea, unable to dump its trash as it was refused by port after port. Tim Jelfs's The Argument about Things in the 1980s considers all this and more in a broad study of the literature and culture of the "long 1980s." It contributes to of-the-moment scholarly debate about material culture, high finance, and ecological degradation, shedding new light on the complex relationship between neoliberalism and cultural life.

Contents:

1. The triumph of neoliberalism

2. After the great transformation

3. Rhopography and realism

4. Matter unmoored

5. At peace with things?

6. All that fall.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 173-198) and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781946684257

1946684252

9781946684264

1946684260

OCLC:

1032719981