Is Disneyland authentic? This is a question I have pondered for a number of years, since I visited what was Eurodisney in 1992 (and explored in my book with Mike Pearson – Theatre/Archaeology – [Link]). It is too easy to say that Disney is superficial, or fantasy, or ideology. Here are a couple of cases…
the shape of history
the rhetoric of remains
Grosser Mercedes 770 – Hitler at Nuremberg in 1935 Twenty artifacts, twenty cars — how do you decide which is the most historically significant? This was the challenge of one of our classes in the Revs Program this term. We have considered the obvious criteria that might be applied — a car associated with an…
Martin Bernal
Martin Bernal died on June 9 in Ithaca NY – Martin Bernal obituary – The Guardian He was controversial, unnecessarily. His basic idea was that Classicists in the nineteenth century distorted the history of Greek antiquity by denying the rich and intense connections among the people and cultures of the eastern Mediterranean, favoring instead an…
Enzo’s Alfa
Our class continues with its exploration of the nature of the historical significance of artifacts. Case study — cars. This evening Jon (Feiber) welcomed us to his wonderful collection to consider the cases of a 1914 Packard, a 1931 Alfa Romeo, and a 1960 Maserati. I couldn’t resist – here I am in the 1931…
design as exchange
Design values in globalism – the vitality of return and exchange Here is my commentary on the design exhibition currently running at Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam [Link]. My previous commentaries – [Link] [Link] Design Column #4 The circle is round ‘The World is Deglobalizing at Breakneck Speed’ – so read the title of a…
historical significance
Does it matter – historically speaking? Just what does that mean? I am helping David Kelley, Jon Feiber, Reilly Brennan, Cliff Nass and our friends in the Revs Program with a class that is exploring the nature of historical significance. In d.school style we are asking the class to come up with the answers. Just…
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