Image from Coce

American plastic : a cultural history / Jeffrey L. Meikle.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, [1995]Copyright date: ©1995Description: xiv, 403 pages : illustrations (some colour) ; 27 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 081352234X
  • 9780813522340
  • 0813522358
  • 9780813522357
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 303.483 20
LOC classification:
  • TP1117 .M45 1995
Contents:
List of Illustrations -- Preface -- Introduction: A Matter of Definition -- 1. Celluloid: From Imitation to Innovation -- 2. Bakelite: Defining an Artificial Material -- 3. Vision and Reality in the Plastic Age -- 4. An Industry Takes Shape -- 5. Nylon: Domesticating a New Synthetic -- 6. Growing Pains: The Conversion to Postwar -- 7. Design in Plastic: From Durable to Disposable -- 8. Material Doubts and Plastic Fallout -- 9. Beyond Plastic: The Culture of Synthesis -- Acknowledgments -- Sources -- Notes -- Index.
Summary: Jeffrey Meikle traces Americans' ambivalent involvement with plastic from Bakelite radios and nylon stockings to Tupperware and polyester suits. He moves easily from the rise of the plastics industry to plastic's symbolic hold on style and the popular imagination. Meikle shows how America's enthusiasm for everything plastic has been complicated by environmental doubts and by the plasticity of postmodern existence. Throughout this witty, compelling history of material and metaphor, Meikle raises crucial issues in science and technology, manufacturing and marketing, design and architecture, and American consumer culture. A provocative conclusion suggests that plastic, endlessly malleable in the face of material desire, merges into the immaterial reality of future electronic media.
Tags from this library: No tags from this library for this title. Log in to add tags.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number Copy number Status Date due Barcode
Book City Campus City Campus Main Collection 303.483 MEI (Browse shelf(Opens below)) 1 Available A146325B

Includes bibliographical references (pages 307-380) and index.

List of Illustrations -- Preface -- Introduction: A Matter of Definition -- 1. Celluloid: From Imitation to Innovation -- 2. Bakelite: Defining an Artificial Material -- 3. Vision and Reality in the Plastic Age -- 4. An Industry Takes Shape -- 5. Nylon: Domesticating a New Synthetic -- 6. Growing Pains: The Conversion to Postwar -- 7. Design in Plastic: From Durable to Disposable -- 8. Material Doubts and Plastic Fallout -- 9. Beyond Plastic: The Culture of Synthesis -- Acknowledgments -- Sources -- Notes -- Index.

Jeffrey Meikle traces Americans' ambivalent involvement with plastic from Bakelite radios and nylon stockings to Tupperware and polyester suits. He moves easily from the rise of the plastics industry to plastic's symbolic hold on style and the popular imagination. Meikle shows how America's enthusiasm for everything plastic has been complicated by environmental doubts and by the plasticity of postmodern existence. Throughout this witty, compelling history of material and metaphor, Meikle raises crucial issues in science and technology, manufacturing and marketing, design and architecture, and American consumer culture. A provocative conclusion suggests that plastic, endlessly malleable in the face of material desire, merges into the immaterial reality of future electronic media.

Machine converted from AACR2 source record.

There are no comments on this title.

to post a comment.

Powered by Koha