L.008.32505 Keeping it Real? Authenticity in American Culture

Lehrende: Eric C. Erbacher

Veranstaltungsart: Proseminar

Orga-Einheit: Anglistik/Amerikanistik

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Semesterwochenstunden: 2

Unterrichtssprache: Englisch

Min. | Max. Teilnehmerzahl: - | 65

Kommentar:
American culture is shaped by a persistent quest for authenticity. In 19th-century literature and arts, authenticity was largely invoked to distance and differentiate the United States from its European cultural roots by stressing uniquely American themes such as wilderness and Natives. As these notions of authentically American arts evolved since the turn of the century, they played an important role in the development of art photography as well as of Abstract Expressionism in the middle of the 20th century. At the same time, a wider cultural anxiety with civilization led to a search to find greater social and personal authenticity in more "primitive" and thus supposedly happier cultures.
Both strains of the constant search for the "real", the emphasis of the truly American and the quest for a seemingly purer past merged in the 20th century in the construction of country music and blues as authentically American musical forms and in the elevation of more simple American design and architectural forms.
More recently, the American desire for authentic products, places, experiences, and sensations revealed itself in a widespread rejection of superficial commercialism and suburban fakery and a turn to allegedly more "real" places: the inner city or the countryside.

The seminar will critically examine various notions and constructions of authenticity as they have been relevant to American culture from the 19th to the 21st centuries. Topics discussed will include American literature, painting, photography, music, TV series, and material culture as well as constructions of place-based lifestyles of authenticity. The course will offer both more general theoretical readings on the desire for the "real" as well as more in-depth analysis of cultural expressions ranging from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, Alfred Stieglitz’ photography, country music and blues to the real-life documentary The Corner, the TV series The Wire and inner-city tourism.

Required reading will be made available. Next to regular participation and weekly reading assignments, participants are expected to prepare and a give a presentation on a session-related topic of their choice.