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THE ART OF DEMOCRACY
THE ART OF DEMOCRACY
A Concise History of Popular Culture in the United States
SECOND EDITION
JIM CULLEN
Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for permission to use
photographs and artwork: p. 1, William Claxton; p. 9, American Antiquarian
Society; p. 26, Houghton Library, Harvard University; p. 33, Harvard Theatre
Collection; p. 50, Harry T. Peters Collection, Museum of the City of New York,
originally published by N. Currier, 1849; p. 73, photograph by Gurney & Son,
New York, Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College; p. 87, Harvard Theatre
Collection; p. 121, Harvard Theatre Collection; p. 128, photograph by Adolph
Witterman, Leonard Hassam Bogart Collection, Museum of the City of New
York; p. 135, Bettmann/Corbis; p. 149, Film Stills, Museum of Modern Art; p.
188, photograph by Bradley Smith/Corbis; p. 201, Photofest; p. 217, Photofest;
p. 272, photograph by Fredrik Nilsen, Slash/Warner Brothers Records; p. 278,
photograph by Jan Butchofsky-Houser/Corbis; p. 289, E! Online, Inc. ©2002.
Copyright © 1996, 2002 by Jim Cullen
All rights reserved
Cullen, Jim, 1962-
The art of democracy : a concise history of U.S. popular culture / by
Jim Cullen.—2nd ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-58367-065-3 —ISBN 1-58367-064-5 (pbk.)
1. Popular culture—United States—History. 2. United States—Civilization. I. Title.
E161 .C85 2002
973-dc21
2002004924
Monthly Review Press
122 West 27th Street
New York, NY 10001
Printed in Canada
10 9 8 7 6 5 4
For Mari Jo and Paul Buhle, mentors
CONTENTS
1. NOVEL APPROACHES The Rise of Popular Culture
A CLOSER LOOK A TEMPLE OF THE IMAGINATION
2. DEMOCRATIC VISTAS The Emergence of Popular Culture, 1800-1860
A CLOSER LOOK THE ASTOR PLACE RIOT THE ART AND LIFE OF FANNY FERN
3. STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT The Segmentation and Consolidation of Popular Culture, 1860-1900
A CLOSER LOOK CONEY ISLAND THE DARK HUMOR OF BERT WILLIAMS
4. MEDIATING COMMUNITIES Popular Culture and Modern Technology, 1900-1945
A CLOSER LOOK CHAPLIN’S BUSINESS BILLIE HOLIDAY, THE JAZZ SINGER
5. SMALL SCREENS Popular Culture in the Age of Television and Beyond, 1945-2000
A CLOSER LOOK A BUNKER MENTALITY THE INTEGRATED SOUND OF LOS LOBOS MTV
6. HARMONIC CONVERGENCE? Across the Digital Frontier
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
When I began writing The Art of Democracy in January of 1993 on an Apple Macintosh SE personal computer, I had never sent or received email. The Netscape Navigator, nevermind the Microsoft Internet Explorer, didn’t exist. And the “information superhighway” so often invoked by the new presidential administration of Bill Clinton was a dimly understood abstraction. I believe my technological naïveté was fairly typical; while there were a lot of people out there with considerable technological savvy in either anticipating or actually immersing themselves in such innovations, many of us dolefully regarded them as necessitating the acquisition of yet another set of technical skills we were going to have to master in order to keep up at our workplaces—or simply to survive in the modern world. Like a lot of folks, I’ve muddled along. And like a lot of folks too, I’ve