Description
Book SynopsisThis book examines how photography, the railroad, electricity, space flight and the computer became central, yet often contradictory, parts of the way Americans construct and narrate their culture. This is a significant contribution to American cultural history, and like David Nye''s previous books, is written to be accessible to a wide audience.
Trade Review". . . For its revealing details, enlightened historiography, breadth of interpretative expertise, and depth of insight this book will be valuable reading for anyone interested either in how American culture was constructed or in what American Studies scholarship can achieve." (American Studies Today, Summer 1998) "The American frontier has always been as much technological as geographical. And if a mythical Wild West underpins America's idea of itself, there are other ways of seeing the same landscape that depend on stories told about electrification and the railroad rather than rifle-toting cowboys. So argues cultural historian David Nye in this intriguing collection of essays about how the citizens of the US have viewed themselves and their country. His theme is how they have constantly refigured the expansion and modernisation of their culture in the vast spaces of North America."
* New Scientist *
Table of ContentsContents: Spaces: constructing nature - Niagara Falls and the Grand Canyon; electrifying the American West - 1880-1940; domestic landscape - Wright Morris' "The Home Place". Narratives: four narratives of new deal electrification; energy narratives; space of the past - E.L. Doctorow's "World's Fair". Narratives in space: electrifying expositions - 1880-1939; European exhibits at the 1939 World's Fair; don't fly me to the moon - the public and the Apollo Space Program; post-modernism and the computer.
