This dissertation delineates the ways in which the political vicissitudes, economic restructuring and cultural fissures of the 1960s and 1970s shaped the commemoration of the Bicentennial of American Independence and elucidates how, in turn, the Bicentennial helped catalyze the eventual emergence of the cultural formations and political economy of neoliberalism. Using cultural studies frameworks to analyze archival policy memoranda, planning, curatorial and design records, journalistic accounts, photographs and audio-visual recordings, I demonstrate that the Bicentennial became a crucible in which Americans across the political spectrum reframed historical narratives, reconceived national identity and debated the proper role of the federal government. This study argues that political, economic and cultural elites mounted events that answered social movement demands for inclusiveness but contained their potential to effect radical change. The corporate sponsorships devised for Bicentennial projects profoundly expanded the role of corporations within the cultural sphere, enabling museums to adapt to the dismantling of the "welfare state" and laying the groundwork for the public-private partnerships that became the cornerstones of neoliberalism in the1980s. Chapter 1 examines a traveling Smithsonian exhibition, "Workers and Allies: Female Participation in the American Trade Union Movement 1824-1876," to illuminate the challenges of conducting public history in a moment when national narratives are highly contested. Chapter 2 argues that the Nixon administration imposed its overriding policy agenda of New Federalism upon the Bicentennial planning process to help engender a conservative realignment of American values and the electorate. Chapter 3 chronicles the transformation of the Smithsonian Festival of American Folklife from a small celebration of deep-rooted folkways with counterhegemonic aims into a grand multicultural Bicentennial spectacle that advanced the ideological and economic prerogatives of the Smithsonian's liberal leadership, of conservative politicians, and its major corporate sponsors. Chapter 4 explores the launch and exhibition design of the American Freedom Train, which marshaled substantial economic and political resources of the federal government and four American corporations - Pepsico, Prudential, Kraftco, and General Motors. This single most widely-circulated project reasserted a teleological narrative of steady economic, technological, and social progress and affirmed the cultural authority of its corporate stewards and the success of privatization. / 2019-04-30T00:00:00Z

The United States Military Academy Band, also known as the West Point Band is the oldest active band in the United States Army and the oldest unit at the United States Military Academy, and is considered to be one of the finest military musical organizations in the world. The band has also been instrumental in facilitating the creation of new works for wind band.As the commissioning of new music has been essential to the expansion of the wind band's repertoire, several major commissioning projects were undertaken in the mid-twentieth century by various organizations, including the West Point Band, the Goldman Band in conjunction with the League of Composers and later the American Bandmasters Association, Kappa Kappa Psi and Tau Beta Sigma, the American Wind Symphony, and the College Band Directors National Association. These commissioning projects and many others have contributed hosts of new quality works to the repertoire of the wind band. The West Point Band's 1952 commissioning project celebrating the Sesquicentennial of the United States Military Academy was among the first of these mid-twentieth century commissioning projects to seek out prominent composers of the day and have them write works for wind band. The project contributed several seminal pieces to the wind band's repertoire, including Morton Gould's Symphony for Band: West Point. In 1996, as tribute to both the Academy and to the earlier commissioning project, the West Point Band sought to celebrate the Academy's 2002 bicentennial in a similar fashion by commissioning well-known composers to contribute substantial wind works. These pieces would be premiered and recorded by the West Point Band over a number of years, including a gala Bicentennial Celebration concert at Carnegie Hall in March 2002. The purpose of this study is to create a consolidated written record of the wind music composed for the West Point Band as part of the band's Bicentennial Wind Commissioning Project, and to describe the process and circumstances by which this music was created and premiered. The continuing development of a quality original repertoire is important to the wind band community as a whole, and commissioning composers to write wind band music is the primary means by which new music is acquired. By any account, the twenty-six works produced through the West Point Band's Bicentennial Commissioning Project constitute a significant contribution to this repertoire. As this project and many of these pieces are not well known, it is the author's intent to bring increased attention to this commissioning project and to this music.

Fondée sur un riche corpus audiovisuel, cette thèse se concentre principalement sur les représentations audiovisuelles de la commémoration du bicentenaire de la Révolution américaine. Composé de trois chapitres, ce travail analyse le processus de construction mémoriel et identitaire qui émergea de cet anniversaire. Mes recherches montrent le caractère démagogique, idéologique et prophétique de la commémoration. Ces évènements célèbrent le passé dans le but de restaurer l’unité et former l’identité nationale afin de façonner l’avenir du pays. Le premier chapitre examine l'importance que le contexte défavorable des années 1970 a joué dans le développement des productions audiovisuelles et comment les organisateurs des évènements ont instrumentalisé le passé afin de rétablir l'unité nationale. Cette instrumentalisation aboutit à la construction d’une mythologie nationale et à l’entretien du souvenir collectif. Dans le deuxième chapitre, on analyse les divers projets nationaux et internationaux et le public visé ou oublié par les organisateurs. On fait aussi ressortir le caractère populaire de la commémoration, et on révèle le mythe identitaire qui l’accompagna. Le multiculturalisme et le contexte historique poussèrent le gouvernement et les organisateurs à imaginer des célébrations à l’échelle mondiale et une universalisation du processus mémoriel participant de la tentation messianique de l’Amérique. Enfin, on démontre comment la mémoire collective nationale a été reconfigurée par une représentation sélective des évènements, des figures et des valeurs de la Révolution en utilisant différentes méthodes et formats de diffusion afin de s’adapter aux enjeux de l’audiovisuel. / Grounded on a rich audiovisual corpus, this dissertation focuses on the audiovisual representations of the commemoration of the American Revolution Bicentennial. Composed of three chapters, this work analyzes the process of memory and identity making that emerged from this anniversary. My research shows the demagogic, ideological and prophetic caracter of the commemoration, a series of events that celebrate the past in order to restore unity, form the national identity and shape the country’s future.The first chapter examines two pivotal aspects of the celebrations: in the one hand, the importance that the adverse context of the seventies played in the development of the audiovisual materials, and on the other hand, how the organizers of the events instrumentalized the past in order to reinstate the national unity. This instrumentalization led to the construction of a national mythology and the preservation of the collective memory.In the second chapter, I analyze the various national and international projects along with the public targeted or consciously forgotten by the organizers. In this chapter, the popular character of the commemoration is highlighted and I unveil the identity myth that went with it. Multiculturalism and historical context pushed the government and the organizers to imagine worldwide celebrations, and an universalization of the memory process evolving around the messianic temptation of the United States.Finally, I demonstrate how the national collective memory was remapped through a selective representation of the Revolution’s events, figures, and values using different broadcasting methods and formats adjusted to audiovisual stakes.

In 1973 , the citizens of Nebraksa embarked upon the Nebraska I-80 Bicentennial Sculpture Project, which provided large roadside sculptures along Interstate 80. A controversial project, referred to as an outdoor sculpture garden, it was completed in 1976 as a lasting commemoration of America's Bicentennial, The sculptures are interspersed for approximately five hundred miles throughout the state and located on alternate sides of the expressway at roadside rest areas.

In analyzing the 1989 bicentennial in Paris, my point of departure has been that the French government, faced with the cool reception to the memory of the Revolution of 1789, was trying to make revolutionary heritage relevant to contemporary concerns, by using allegorical techniques of spatializing and visualizing history while consequently (yet paradoxically, since it ran against their intentions) effecting a smooth passage for this heritage into the world of commodity and spectacle. To analyze this dilemma, I investigated the mechanisms of representation and the tension between spectacle and politically engaged imagery. Drawing from the work of Water Benjamin, the thesis proposed to use allegory as a mode of political criticism and redemptive interpretation. The analysis of the programming of events, for example, revealed that it contained a moral tale of sacrifice, and praised the power of the memory of the Revolution to form a community, not based on ethnicity or shared history but on shared ideals. The analysis of the use of collage in the Bastille Day Parade revealed that it reworked Republican notions of ‘fraternity in a post-colonial era to reflect contemporary discussions of métissage and take a position on its relationship to democracy. By looking at this commemoration allegorically, the double meanings inscribed in the bicentennial program, exhibits, monuments and parade can be unpacked. But the allegorical critique is violent, it does not carefully excavate layers of meaning through a gentle and constructive hermeneutic circle, it requires that the objects that are being contemplated be in fragments. As the allegorist reassembles the fragments into new meaningful constellations, the constructions remain open, driven by the impossibility of recovering what has been lost, always pointing to the instability of meaning. The analysis of the commemoration recognized that commodification and spectacularisation happen, but through reversal it also showed that the 1989 bicentennial draws from a constantly evolving relationship to memory which allows for investment on the part of the public. Because the commemoration is a powerful form of visualizing and spatializing history that occurs in public spaces, many provocative images were taken up by the press and written about, which ultimately reconfigured present-day discussions about democracy and citizenship.

In analyzing the 1989 bicentennial in Paris, my point of departure has been that the French government, faced with the cool reception to the memory of the Revolution of 1789, was trying to make revolutionary heritage relevant to contemporary concerns, by using allegorical techniques of spatializing and visualizing history while consequently (yet paradoxically, since it ran against their intentions) effecting a smooth passage for this heritage into the world of commodity and spectacle. To analyze this dilemma, I investigated the mechanisms of representation and the tension between spectacle and politically engaged imagery. Drawing from the work of Water Benjamin, the thesis proposed to use allegory as a mode of political criticism and redemptive interpretation. The analysis of the programming of events, for example, revealed that it contained a moral tale of sacrifice, and praised the power of the memory of the Revolution to form a community, not based on ethnicity or shared history but on shared ideals. The analysis of the use of collage in the Bastille Day Parade revealed that it reworked Republican notions of ‘fraternity in a post-colonial era to reflect contemporary discussions of métissage and take a position on its relationship to democracy. By looking at this commemoration allegorically, the double meanings inscribed in the bicentennial program, exhibits, monuments and parade can be unpacked. But the allegorical critique is violent, it does not carefully excavate layers of meaning through a gentle and constructive hermeneutic circle, it requires that the objects that are being contemplated be in fragments. As the allegorist reassembles the fragments into new meaningful constellations, the constructions remain open, driven by the impossibility of recovering what has been lost, always pointing to the instability of meaning. The analysis of the commemoration recognized that commodification and spectacularisation happen, but through reversal it also showed that the 1989 bicentennial draws from a constantly evolving relationship to memory which allows for investment on the part of the public. Because the commemoration is a powerful form of visualizing and spatializing history that occurs in public spaces, many provocative images were taken up by the press and written about, which ultimately reconfigured present-day discussions about democracy and citizenship. / Arts, Faculty of / Geography, Department of / Graduate

Uppsatsen beskriver utveckling av medvetandets filosofi i science fiction mellan 1800-talet och mitten av 1900-talet. För analysen används Mary Shelleys Frankenstein och Isaac Asimovs the Bicentennial Man. Utvecklingen i science fiction går parallellt med utveckling inom filosofin. Utvecklingen går mot en fysikalisk lösning på kropp och medvetande problemet med argument från behaviorismen, identitetsteorin, samt funktionalismen.

Se focalisant sur les quatre spectacles montés dans les deux périodes où la conception orthodoxe de la révolution socialiste est remise en question par l’expansion du néo-libéralisme, cette thèse vise à révéler simultanément les diverses approches théâtrales et problématiques du mythe historique et leur lien indissociable avec les problèmes sociopolitiques de l’époque. Face à la démoralisation profonde chez les militants suite à la défaite politique du mouvement de Mai 68, le Théâtre du Soleil essaie de démystifier l’Histoire de la Révolution française pour s’interroger sur l’esprit révolutionnaire contemporain et sur le développement démocratique des temps modernes. Son diptyque révolutionnaire – 1789 et 1793 – dévoile non seulement la combativité commune entre les différentes générations engagées, mais perce également les problèmes cruciaux de ses actualités politiques. Contrairement à l’atmosphère commémorative et festive du bicentenaire de la Révolution française, Klaus Michael Grüber et Matthias Langhoff adoptent parallèlement une approche distanciée et problématique pour révéler les ambiguïtés entre la prise de conscience individuelle et l’engagement collectif, entre le dilemme existentiel d’un révolutionnaire désabusé et son idéal politique. La Mort de Danton et La Mission/ Au Perroquet vert font écho à la désorientation générale entraînée par la désintégration du bloc de l’Est vers la fin de l’année 1989. À travers ces quatre créations théâtrales, nous nous rapprochons des contradictions de l’humanité confrontée au sursaut historique pour surmonter les limites des révolutions passées et créer des nouvelles possibilités d’actions révolutionnaires futures. / This thesis focuses on four performances staged in two periods when the orthodox view of the socialist revolution was being challenged by the spread of neo-liberalism. In parallel, it aims to throw light on the various theatrical and theoretical approaches to the historical myth and their inextricable link with the sociopolitical problems of the age. In light of the deep sense of demoralisation felt by activists in the wake of the political defeat of the May 68 movement, the Théâtre du Soleil tries to demystify the history of the French Revolution to examine the contemporary revolutionary spirit and the growth of democracy in our modern age. In 1789 and 1793 it reveals the general sense of combativeness that pervaded all age groups, and turns the spotlight on the critical problems of current political issues. In contrast to the commemorative and festive atmosphere of the bicentennial of the French Revolution, Klaus Michael Grüber and Matthias Langhoff adopt a more objective, theoretical approach in order to reveal the ambiguities that exist between individual understanding and collective engagement, between the existential dilemma of disillusioned revolutionaries and their political ideals. Danton's Death and The Mission/The Green Cockatoo reflect the general sense of disorientation felt in the wake of the collapse of the Eastern bloc at the end of 1989. These four theatrical pieces allow us to gain an insight into the contradictions of humankind when confronted with momentous historical events in order to move beyond the limits of previous revolutions and create new possibilities for future revolutionary actions.

El presente trabajo analiza el discurso de los programas periodísticos Beto a saber y 2020 sobre la construcción de la identidad de la denominada Generación del Bicentenario como actores en las protestas que ocurrieron durante la crisis política en noviembre del 2020 en el Perú. El propósito es identificar, desde ambos medios, las matices y diferencias que contribuyeron con la construcción de los actores mencionados. El análisis se conforma de la selección de tres programas de cada espacio periodístico. Para lograr los objetivos planteados, se emplea un método de investigación de tipo aplicada con enfoque cualitativo y de nivel descriptivo interpretativo. Con los resultados obtenidos se alcanza a descubrir y describir las particularidades en el modo de construir la identidad de los actores, es decir, de la Generación del Bicentenario en cada uno de los programas. Además, pone en evidencia criterios y percepciones de los enunciadores frente a esta problemática. / The present investigation analyzes the discourse of the journalistic programs Beto a saber and 2020 on the construction of the identity of the so-called Generación del Bicentenario (or Bicentennial Generation) as actors in the protests that occurred during the political crisis in November 2020 in Peru. The purpose is to identify, from both journalistic spaces, the nuances and differences that contributed to the construction of the aforementioned actors. The analysis is made up of the selection of three programs from each space. To achieve the proposed objectives, an applied research method with a qualitative approach and a descriptive-interpretive level is used. With the results obtained, it is possible to discover and describe the particularities in the way of constructing the identity of the actors, the Generación del Bicentenario (or Bicentennial Generation) in each of the programs. In addition, it highlights the criteria and perceptions of the enunciators in the face of this problem. / Tesis

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