This dissertation focuses on masculinity in discourses of nostalgia and nation in popular films and texts of the late 20th centurys millennial periodthe Bill Clinton years, from 1992-2001. As the 1990s progressed, masculinity crises and millennial anxieties intersected with an increasing fixation on nostalgic popular histories of World War II. The representative masculine figures proffered in Steven Spielberg films and Tom Hanks roles had critical relationships to cultural traumas surrounding race, reproduction and sexuality. Nostalgic narratives emerged as way to fortify the American nation-state and resolve its social problems. The WWII cultural trend, through the specter of tributes to a dying generation, used nostalgic texts and images to create imaginary American landscapes that centered as much on contemporary masculinity and the political and social perspective of the Boomer generation as it did on the prior one. The conceit of Clintons masculinity is used as the figural link between the male bodies represented in such popular 1990s films as Amistad, Saving Private Ryan and The Green Mile. Additional chapters focus on Tom Hanks star persona, the notion of boyhood, and the nexus between pop cultural imagery and representations of nostalgia.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PITT/oai:PITTETD:etd-06042009-183445 |
| Date | 18 February 2010 |
| Creators | Brown, Molly Diane |
| Contributors | Brent Malin, Adam Lowenstein, Marcia Landy, Lucy Fischer |
| Publisher | University of Pittsburgh |
| Source Sets | University of Pittsburgh |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.pitt.edu/ETD/available/etd-06042009-183445/ |
| Rights | restricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Pittsburgh or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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