As the published author of six books, and someone who has researched the period of the 1950's extensively for the past 5 years, but more important, someone who was actually ALIVE during the period, I really don't know where to start here. Were kids playing outside for 8 hours at a time (without parents' worrying about anything happening to them), and having a great time, day after day, that was imaginary, right? Was the bread truck I used to see on summer mornings imaginary? And the milk truck? And the 100 other things that I could list here? Jesus, what a crock. Maybe kids were happy then but they shouldn't have been? Is that the argument?
I don't want to spend a lot of time on this-- but I'll also say this: it's EXTREMELY naeve on your part to think that when people think of nostalgia, they mean there were NO problems. That's simply naeve on your part-- the very reductionism you're accusing of others here.
The thing about what kids remember from vacations is just bogus psychobabble. Asked about their vacation, what do you think they will say? Try asking them about the bad things that happened on their vacation-- think they'll say there weren't any? It's just simply bogus.
Do you think Betty Friedan had a "typical" 50's upbringing? Should she be the voice of what the other 94% of the people were doing then? Think anything about her, or her agenda, is typical or representative of what went on? How about a kid in an iron lung from polio in the 50's? Should he be the voice of his generation? A typical 50's kid? Good idea, or bad idea?
Who exactly do you think is being nostalgic for the 50's? Describe them. Don't leave it fuzzy-- describe these nostalgic people? Who are they? How old are they? Are they the parents from back then, who are now 90? Are they the ones being nostalgic here? Or is it the kids from back then? And the kids were all unhappy? Or were they actually happy, but they should have been less happy? Or unhappy?
Your little article reads like a description of what life in Europe is like by someone who has never been to Europe, or like a description of military life is like by someone who's never been in the military. (Also: the Sixties... a "turbulent" time. lol). You worked in a cheesy little 50's retro restaurant for 3 years and that's your background for being an expert on the era? From that?
My fond hope is that about 30 years from now you read some article by a 19 year old kid telling you what it felt like to grow up in the 90's-- some kid who was never there himself. I'll leave you with two quick thoughts to mull over: (1) Today, things like Norman Rockwell's pictures and "Leave It To Beaver" are mocked for their inaccuracy. At the TIME they were liked for their ACCURACY. Think about that and what that means.
(2) If you want to be a writer, write about what you know, not about what you don't know. When you write about things you don't know, little gaps and giveaways appear in the prose in silent ways you're not aware of. You can fake most of it, you can paper over the gaps with smooth prose (the Sixties-- a "turbulent" era) , but in the back of the reader's mind little bells are going off. Write about something you know.
Re: Crock refuteddreamkeepr18April 8 2007, 18:52:08 UTC
I think you missed my point. I didn't set out to set up the 50s as imaginary. And Leave it to Beaver being praised at the time for its accuracy of life? That's like saying that Full House was the epitomy of all middle-class families of the 90s.
This paper's intent is to explore why we seem to idealize things in the past; I do not say anywhere that "everyone" has idealized images. I wanted to understand why people think of the past in certain ways.
You are incorrect in believing that idealization of memories means "fake memories." If you read the section on idealization it means that people tend to gloss over the negative memories and hurts and pains in life and clump the good and happy memories together. No where in this paper do I say that idealized memories are false and never happened. Of course the 50s happened, of course there were some families like the Leave it to Beaver family, of course there were milk trucks and children playing in the streets. I'm not doubting that.
I don't agree with your assessment about idealized vacations. If someone asked me about a trip I took I would instantly remember all the good things about it. I do concede the point that when asked if there was anything bad that happened that people will remember those things. However, I believe that over time the bad memories and pains and hurts are lessened to a point where it hardly seemed so bad anymore. That is not some random thing I believe but is psychologically defined.
When researching for this paper I couldn't find a whole lot of general information on the topic of 1950s nostalgia. Sure there were books on families in the 50s, shopping in the 50s, advertising in the 50s but I chose the books I used with generalities in mind. Why do you disagree with Betty Friedan and not any of the others? What about Bill Bryson? Should he not be the voice of a generation? There is no one voice for any generation and that's why I tried to use several different and varying sources on the topic.
As for your question about who I think is nostalgic I don't have a definate answer because different people are nostalgic for different eras in time. There's no way to label a person and say, "yep, she likes the 50s" or "man, he's totaly a 50s nostaglic."
I agree that I wasn't born in that era and I have no idea what the time and place was like. What I do have is these idealized visions of the 50s and that's what I wanted to understand; how do we get these skewed visions of the past? A lot of them are romantic or fantasy-like visions because we never experienced it and can only rely on media to show us what it was like. It's the same with romantic ideals of the medieval period.
I never claimed to be an expert; this paper was written to explore why we feel nostalgic for a certain era and how we get idealized visions of the past.
This paper is trying to explain that the media-centered images that we have today are NOT what the 50s was like. Not everyone lived the Leave it to Beaver lifestyle, hell, I doubt there were any families that were exactly like that. And you're telling me yes, it was like that? Let me put this in context then, it's like looking back on the 2000s from 50 years into the future and saying that American families were similar to Desperate Housewives and Sex in the City and Friends and the plethora of other fantastical tv shows. People don't live like that, and the few that do aren't exactly like any of the characters on the tv shows.
Good writers are able to write about things that they don't know. I'm talking fiction here; how would we have sci-fi or fantasy genres if writers stuck to what they know? I know that I have idealized images of the past and from the books I've read and research, I'm not the only one. I don't think you understood what my paper intended, maybe I didn't come off as clear as I wanted but there was a lot of stuff to write on that I didn't even touch. My point, which you completely twisted around, is not that the 50s are all idealized and fake. I made no such claims. The 50s weren't fake but apparently you just are "idealizing" specific sections in the paper and creating your own claim instead of seeing my own.
I don't want to spend a lot of time on this-- but I'll also say this: it's EXTREMELY naeve on your part to think that when people think of nostalgia, they mean there were NO problems. That's simply naeve on your part-- the very reductionism you're accusing of others here.
The thing about what kids remember from vacations is just bogus psychobabble. Asked about their vacation, what do you think they will say? Try asking them about the bad things that happened on their vacation-- think they'll say there weren't any? It's just simply bogus.
Do you think Betty Friedan had a "typical" 50's upbringing? Should she be the voice of what the other 94% of the people were doing then? Think anything about her, or her agenda, is typical or representative of what went on? How about a kid in an iron lung from polio in the 50's? Should he be the voice of his generation? A typical 50's kid? Good idea, or bad idea?
Who exactly do you think is being nostalgic for the 50's? Describe them. Don't leave it fuzzy-- describe these nostalgic people? Who are they? How old are they? Are they the parents from back then, who are now 90? Are they the ones being nostalgic here? Or is it the kids from back then? And the kids were all unhappy? Or were they actually happy, but they should have been less happy? Or unhappy?
Your little article reads like a description of what life in Europe is like by someone who has never been to Europe, or like a description of military life is like by someone who's never been in the military. (Also: the Sixties... a "turbulent" time. lol).
You worked in a cheesy little 50's retro restaurant for 3 years and that's your background for being an expert on the era? From that?
My fond hope is that about 30 years from now you read some article by a 19 year old kid telling you what it felt like to grow up in the 90's-- some kid who was never there himself.
I'll leave you with two quick thoughts to mull over:
(1) Today, things like Norman Rockwell's pictures and "Leave It To Beaver" are mocked for their inaccuracy. At the TIME they were liked for their ACCURACY. Think about that and what that means.
(2) If you want to be a writer, write about what you know, not about what you don't know. When you write about things you don't know, little gaps and giveaways appear in the prose in silent ways you're not aware of. You can fake most of it, you can paper over the gaps with smooth prose (the Sixties-- a "turbulent" era) , but in the back of the reader's mind little bells are going off.
Write about something you know.
Good luck
Reply
This paper's intent is to explore why we seem to idealize things in the past; I do not say anywhere that "everyone" has idealized images. I wanted to understand why people think of the past in certain ways.
You are incorrect in believing that idealization of memories means "fake memories." If you read the section on idealization it means that people tend to gloss over the negative memories and hurts and pains in life and clump the good and happy memories together. No where in this paper do I say that idealized memories are false and never happened. Of course the 50s happened, of course there were some families like the Leave it to Beaver family, of course there were milk trucks and children playing in the streets. I'm not doubting that.
I don't agree with your assessment about idealized vacations. If someone asked me about a trip I took I would instantly remember all the good things about it. I do concede the point that when asked if there was anything bad that happened that people will remember those things. However, I believe that over time the bad memories and pains and hurts are lessened to a point where it hardly seemed so bad anymore. That is not some random thing I believe but is psychologically defined.
When researching for this paper I couldn't find a whole lot of general information on the topic of 1950s nostalgia. Sure there were books on families in the 50s, shopping in the 50s, advertising in the 50s but I chose the books I used with generalities in mind. Why do you disagree with Betty Friedan and not any of the others? What about Bill Bryson? Should he not be the voice of a generation? There is no one voice for any generation and that's why I tried to use several different and varying sources on the topic.
As for your question about who I think is nostalgic I don't have a definate answer because different people are nostalgic for different eras in time. There's no way to label a person and say, "yep, she likes the 50s" or "man, he's totaly a 50s nostaglic."
I agree that I wasn't born in that era and I have no idea what the time and place was like. What I do have is these idealized visions of the 50s and that's what I wanted to understand; how do we get these skewed visions of the past? A lot of them are romantic or fantasy-like visions because we never experienced it and can only rely on media to show us what it was like. It's the same with romantic ideals of the medieval period.
I never claimed to be an expert; this paper was written to explore why we feel nostalgic for a certain era and how we get idealized visions of the past.
This paper is trying to explain that the media-centered images that we have today are NOT what the 50s was like. Not everyone lived the Leave it to Beaver lifestyle, hell, I doubt there were any families that were exactly like that. And you're telling me yes, it was like that? Let me put this in context then, it's like looking back on the 2000s from 50 years into the future and saying that American families were similar to Desperate Housewives and Sex in the City and Friends and the plethora of other fantastical tv shows. People don't live like that, and the few that do aren't exactly like any of the characters on the tv shows.
Good writers are able to write about things that they don't know. I'm talking fiction here; how would we have sci-fi or fantasy genres if writers stuck to what they know? I know that I have idealized images of the past and from the books I've read and research, I'm not the only one. I don't think you understood what my paper intended, maybe I didn't come off as clear as I wanted but there was a lot of stuff to write on that I didn't even touch. My point, which you completely twisted around, is not that the 50s are all idealized and fake. I made no such claims. The 50s weren't fake but apparently you just are "idealizing" specific sections in the paper and creating your own claim instead of seeing my own.
Reply
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