Cultural History (AS)

Question 1

Explain the concept of the Simulacrum

Answer 1

A simulation of reality, with no real relation to that reality
> copies of copies

Question 2

Explain the concept of pastiche

Answer 2

• Post-Marxist
  > appropriation of existing elements, used for own purposes
  > re-use, re-appropriation, combination
• compare bricolage
  BUT: self-conscious, tongue in cheek

Question 3

Explain the concept of appropriation

Answer 3

taking and making one’s own

Question 4

Explain parody

Answer 4

An imitation of the style of a particular writer, artist, or genre with deliberate exaggeration for comic effect.

> stresses values of that which it makes fun of

Question 5

Describe the three orders of simulacra as per Baudrillard

Answer 5

prior to first stage:
> Feudal times
- sign matches signified

first-order simulacrum:
> Renaissance till Industrial Rev. 
- simulacra as counterfeit
> disconnect, emancipation of sign > accessible to everyone
> still tied to the real

second-order simulacrum:
> modern / industrial era
- automated serial reproduction
- reproducibility of consumer objects
> copies of copies, no original
> notion of real still exist, utopia of retrun to real

third-order simulacrum
> current code-governed phase (postmodernism)
- perception through simulation
- hypercommodities in hyperreality
> no longer difference between simulation and real > no utopia of return
> real becomes fetishistic object of nostalgia

Question 6

Define nostalgia

Answer 6

longing for

• irrecoverable past
• imagined past
• idealized past

Bakhtin:
historical inversion: the ideal that is not being lived now is projected into the past

> invocation of partial, idealized history, merges with dissatisfaction with present

> reinstates the authentic and real

information technology allows past to move into the orbit of the present

Question 7

Define irony

Answer 7

stating the opposite of what is meant

> the ‘said’ and the ‘unsaid’ meet and create irony

Question 8

Explain the role of irony and nostalgia in the Postmodern

Answer 8

Hutcheon:
in the postmodern nostalgia gets called up, exploited and ironized
> recalling of the past, using nostalgic power, while acknowledging the impossibility of nostalgic longing

> ironized nostalgia confirms validity of past, without its burden, without claiming authenticity of past

> exposure of nostalgia, through irony