Random Fashion Thoughts (Part 3: Style farmer strikes back) - our general discussion thread

[erictheobscure]

Do they also listen to Oasis, Hootie and the Blowfish, and Counting Crows? Unironically? Or unironically ironically, since it was the 90s?

my best guess would be:

not often, really; nope; wouldn't really admit to it but sometimes while drunk

mostly unironic; n/a; drunkenness and irony only flimsy veils draped over sincere nostalgia for a time when a career in academia seemed impressive and desirable

 

[LA Guy]

what an intriguing look into what boggles fok's mind: people ********** to portishead; people not mentioning oasis.

i can only hope there's some sort of venn diagram with "people ********** to oasis while talking about portishead" in the middle.

The first boggles my mind not at all. I mean, Roads basically is the fadeout music for a sex scene in a PG 13 movie/Netflix mini-series.

Not mentioning Oasis in a lot of pages of discussions about pop music in the 90s is sorta mind-boggling.

Incidentally, let's start to use the more accurate term "Euler diagram." Venn diagrams are a subset of Euler diagrams, and much more limited in their application.

 

[erictheobscure]

 

[LA Guy]

mostly unironic; n/a; drunkenness and irony only flimsy veils draped over sincere nostalgia for a time when a career in academia seemed impressive and desirable

I assumed that I would end up teaching either at a big comprehensive university in Boston or NYC or something like that, or at a good liberal arts college somewhere in New England. A few academic generations ago, this was probably not really a pipe dream. When I started applying for faculty positions, three of us, all postdocs from our single group at Harvard, were interviewing for the same positions all over the country.

There were something like 1500 applicants for some jobs. None had fewer than 300 applications. I was lucky in that my background and letters at least got me into the pool of "viable" candidates. All this is particularly insane considering that the positions were for basically a 5 year probationary period during which you were going to be in a pressure cooker, after which, if you didn't make it, it was going to become increasingly harder to find the next job.

It's not hard to see when the shift in the system occurred. If you look at the academic background, credentials, and publication records of academics at the second and third tier univerisities across the US of academics hired in the 70s, 80s and 90s, they are generally much less impressive than the backgrounds of some of the newer faculty.

In Canada, the abolishment of mandatory retirement for faculty members at 65 has led to pretty much the same issue.

 

[double00]

um Polly Jean Harvey? Mr Bungle? RFTC?!! cmon now 90s were interesting

 

[LA Guy]

Incidentally, the whole "adjunct faculty" phenomenon is complete horseshit. I would say that it's possibly more horseshit than Uber and Lyft's claims that their drivers are contractors and not employees. At least with driveshare companies, you are not expected to keep specific, regular, hours.

Teaching a single course, right now, pays something like $5K/course/quarter, sometimes a bit more, sometimes a bit less. So, if you are teaching a three course load (pretty standard but on the high side for regular faculty), you are making $15 K for course preparation, support, and grading. If you teach that load year around, including summer school, you are making $60K/a, no benefits, no job security, and you pay self-employment taxes.

 

[erictheobscure]

There were something like 1500 applicants for some jobs. None had fewer than 300 applications. I was lucky in that my background and letters at least got me into the pool of "viable" candidates. All this is particularly insane considering that the positions were for basically a 5 year probationary period during which you were going to be in a pressure cooker, after which, if you didn't make it, it was going to become increasingly harder to find the next job.

Even though I know it's not true, I always just assume in the back of my head that you're all rollin' balls deep in grant money and champagne over there in the sciences.

I've Forrest Gumped my way into tenure at a good job, in a field where good jobs are almost impossible to secure (with the caveat that good jobs might be all that are left because prestigious institutions are the only ones still hiring actively). But the feelings of bewilderment & gratitude are offset by a feeling of surliness about what I've gotten myself into.

Also: one of the constant sources of anxiety in my life is the possibility that PJ Harvey was better than Björk all along, and that at some point, I might have to acknowledge it. I'm still resisting though.

 

[Fuuma]

I think poptivists would agree that things are still stratified, but that things are moving in a more democratic direction. And that, should you choose to watch Friends because you find it funny, that's totally OK.

This feels like Thomas Friedman's book The World is Flat. Critics argued that the world is not, in fact, flat. But this could be all settled with him renaming the book, The World Is Flatter Now Than It Once Was.

This wouldn't solve the mathematical problem inherent in thinking that a flatter world be more not less connected than a round one. Friedman is the id of the managerial class and the result is not pretty.

 

[smittycl]

Oasis was great and hit big but faded fast. Morning Glory was a smash album but they just didn't resonate with me in the long term.

 

[LA Guy]

Even though I know it's not true, I always just assume in the back of my head that you're all rollin' balls deep in grant money and champagne over there in the sciences.

I've Forrest Gumped my way into tenure at a good job, in a field where good jobs are almost impossible to secure (with the caveat that good jobs might be all that are left because prestigious institutions are the only ones still hiring actively). But the feelings of bewilderment & gratitude are offset by a feeling of surliness about what I've gotten myself into.

Also: one of the constant sources of anxiety in my life is the possibility that PJ Harvey was better than Björk all along, and that at some point, I might have to acknowledge it. I'm still resisting though.

I tendered my resignation in 2012 (formally ending my duties in January 2013), to work on this and other tech and tech adjacent businesses, and am so happy with my decision. The acute stresses of business are so much better than the slow, soul killing stress of academia. My wife has tenure, and is hopefully on her way to full professorship. My attitude towards academia since my resignation has been gradually souring more and more, tbh.

I think that anyone with any degree of intelligence and self-awareness understands that we are all Forrest Gumping our way through careers.

 

[dieworkwear]

This wouldn't solve the mathematical problem inherent in thinking that a flatter world be more not less connected than a round one. Friedman is the id of the managerial class and the result is not pretty.

"The World is Flatter Now Than It Once Was, By Which Mean The Topographical Features Are Smoother and Allow For More Connectivity, And I Mean This In Particular Ways That Intersect With My Interests In Political Economy and Not Other Ways of Culture" by Thomas Friedman

 

[LA Guy]

"The World is Flatter Now Than It Once Was, By Which Mean The Topographical Features Are Smoother and Allow For More Connectivity, And I Mean This In Particular Ways That Intersect With My Interests In Political Economy and Not Other Ways of Culture" by Thomas Friedman

Sounds about as specific as a few papers I've written.

 

[Fuuma]

I hear what you say, and frankly, I'm sympathetic, but I think that the same snobbery still exists. Just certain groups have been given entrance into the club of acceptable tastes - in this way I am in partial agreement with Austerlitz. Just reading over the discussion here, many, if not most, of the bands here were never on any mainstream pop or rock lists. I'm not as familiar with R&B (has never been a go to for me), and so can't comment on that at all. But check this list by Fuuma:

You had all those droning acts like Mogwai, Godspeed you black emperor etc.
Trip hop if you're into that (the number of people who had sex to Portishead is mind boggling)
Sonic youth kept releasing good stuff and grunge bands followed up
Pavement, Primal scream
Silver Jews were around (RIP)
All these kinda upper middle brow bands electro acts like Boards of Canada, Amon Tobin or Autechre released their best inputs.
Techno as we know it emerged and hip hop became ascendant
Blur, Pulp and all those brit assholes
Church burning Norwegians invented black metal
Shoegaze with My bloody valentine and assorted acts

Many of those are pretty niche.

And there is a notable lack of some of the really big acts of the 1990s. I don't think that a single person here has mentioned Oasis, for example, which is pretty mindboggling, seeing how popular they were in the mid 90s, or bands like Counting Crows, who you couldn't go to any bar in the 90s without hearing... a lot. And The Dave Matthews Band and Hootie and the Blowfish were summarily dismissed.

Television is the same way. The Office (the American version) constitutes some insane numbers of minutes watched on Netflix - something like 45.8 billion minutes watched compared to 27.6 Billion minutes of “Stranger Things,” and something like 72% of all minutes watched on netflix are "library" so, mostly reruns. Incidentally, Friends is another huge draw. But someone watching reruns of Friends, or likeing some band that was featured on Friends (see Hootie and the Blowfish) is shorthand for someone being basic.

Would members of cultural elites accept that someone who enjoys spending evenings watching reruns of Friends and also have a deep understanding of the cultural resonance and significance of Friends and The Office as non-basic? I'm not so sure.

Oasis was part of Britpop and would be included in the category "Blur, Pulp and all those brit assholes"...

Now we've had this discussion several times before and the answer is still the same; research doesn't show a "democratization of taste" as dieworkwear would have it (i.e. a disappearance of snobbishness or standards) but a different way of acquiring and maintaining status, more centered on the "how" than the "what". Omnivorous consumption means having a coherent narrative about the mix of low/mid/high culture stuff we consume. Low status people a) don't have the right narrative even if they consume the right stuff (i.e. nouveau riche collecting antiques but being unable to link it to something of culture significance) and/or b) don't have the right mix (just low stuff).

I know plenty of people into watching Friends and I think you had some popculture recent articles on how it's cool to watch it or whatever (might have been in the Atlantic but not sure).

Social science BBC4 podcast on snobbery (subscribe to this,especia;lly if you like Laurie Taylor):

BBC Radio 4 - Thinking Allowed, Snobbery

Snobbery - its meaning, history and changing nature.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[dieworkwear]

Now we've had this discussion several times before and the answer is still the same; research doesn't show a "democratization of taste" as dieworkwear would have it (i.e. a disappearance of snobbishness or standards) but a different way of acquiring and maintaining status, more centered on the "how" than the "what". Omnivorous consumption means having a coherent narrative about the mix of low/mid/high culture stuff we consume. Low status people a) don't have the right narrative even if they consume the right stuff (i.e. nouveau riche collecting antiques but being unable to link it to something of culture significance) and/or b) don't have the right mix (just low stuff).

That's what I said!

You can still be basic, but the idea is that "low culture" is taken much more seriously now. You can also have a sophisticated understanding of low culture, which makes you not basic.

 

[dfagdfsh]

Maybe if you're unhappy with being an adjunct you should've bootstrapped your way into a tenure track position 45 years ago. (or just work in administration, like me!)