Uses and Abuses of Culture : Greece 1974-2010.

Intro -- Table of Contents -- LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS -- PREFACE -- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS -- INTRODUCTION -- CHAPTER ONE -- PATHOLOGIES OF GREEK SOCIETY -- Heroic Models and Romantic Narrations -- Romantic Nationalism and Orthodox Christian Identity -- The Family and its Complexities -- Migration and its Dowry -- CHAPTER TWO -- ARTISTIC CREATION AS AN EXPRESSION OF POLITICAL FREEDOM -- Trends and Tastes of an Incomplete Decade -- Political Songs and Heroic Standards -- From Greek Leventiá to Greek Mangiá -- Looking Towards Europe -- Culture as Vehicle to Political Aspirations -- The Social Aspect of the Image -- Shaping the Art Audience -- "Us and Them" -- The Art Market and the Society of Prosperity -- CHAPTER THREE -- THE HAZY LANDSCAPE OF PROSPERITY IN 1980S GREECE -- Romantic Nationalism between "Change" and Conservatism -- Image and Power -- Culture for Domestic and Foreign Consumption -- A Celebration of Culture -- Good and Bad Taste -- Shaping the Art Audience, Part II -- Art as a Commodity -- CHAPTER FOUR -- FLUID CONSTRUCTS (1989-2004) -- Modernization versus Nationalism Fueled by Prosperity -- Image and Power, Part II -- Art, the Art Market, and the Business World -- CHAPTER FIVE -- CHIMERICAL PURSUITS -- Cultural Diffusions -- The Free Press and Urban Culture -- Athens' New Cultural Geographies -- Cultural Geographies -- Censorship as Protector of Tradition -- EPILOGUE -- NOTES -- BIBLIOGRAPHY -- INDEX.

Uses and Abuses of Culture: Greece 1974-2010 presents a new perspective on the ongoing crisis and the broader debate concerning the case of Greece. It examines contemporary perceptions of Greek identity and cultural memory as salient factors of this crisis. The book focuses on the era that began with the fall of the dictatorship in Greece, in 1974, and investigates previous and current pathologies of Greek society in relation to the ways they affected the understanding of the term 'culture' up to and including the year 2010. The chapters are structured around pivotal political and social events, and highlight characteristic examples of contemporary visual culture; these encapsulate the tendencies, attitudes, values and ethics of modern Greek society. The book examines issues of cultural identity and collective memory, and explores phenomena of authority and censorship. It argues that participation in culture is equally due to the power of antiquity as well as to the new social values of distinction. A key area of the research centres on the contradictions and conflicts between intrinsic components of Greek cultural and national identities and its adopted European identity, the latter gradually formulated upon Greece's entry into the European Community in 1981.

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Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2024. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.