I’ve never been one to enjoy writing or speeches that began with jargon like “Thomas Jefferson once said….” However, in this dawn of a new decade, a particular quote of our third United States President seems too tailored to this moment. “I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.”
I don’t know anyone who doesn’t like the future better than the history of the past, hence the slew of New Year’s resolutions: “I want to eat healthier,” “I want to save more money,” “I want to get more organized,” “I want to get in shape,” “I want to travel more…” You get the idea. Like famous quotations as literary hooks, I’ve also never been a fan of resolutions. Yet here I am, with a resolution of my own, this blog: Deconstructing the Decade.
To be fair, I am not solely going to deconstruct the decade’s prominent events and figures, but rather explore the decade’s icons as symbols. This blog’s rhetorical criticism will aim to isolate specific significant symbols from 2000 to 2010 discovering how, and how well, they work: how they instruct, inform, entertain, move, arouse, perform, convince and, in general, persuade their audience.
Turn on the television—the media outlets are churning out exhausted sound-bites and featurettes about the past decade. What these retrospectives lack, are analysis. Looking backward is always the best way to look forward, but real dissection in necessary in order to gain any meaningful perspective.
So that’s what this blog is about: essays, mini-essays and articles, critically analyzing significant historic, cultural symbols of this past decade.
Here’s to 2010 and beyond. Stay tuned.
I don’t know anyone who doesn’t like the future better than the history of the past, hence the slew of New Year’s resolutions: “I want to eat healthier,” “I want to save more money,” “I want to get more organized,” “I want to get in shape,” “I want to travel more…” You get the idea. Like famous quotations as literary hooks, I’ve also never been a fan of resolutions. Yet here I am, with a resolution of my own, this blog: Deconstructing the Decade.
To be fair, I am not solely going to deconstruct the decade’s prominent events and figures, but rather explore the decade’s icons as symbols. This blog’s rhetorical criticism will aim to isolate specific significant symbols from 2000 to 2010 discovering how, and how well, they work: how they instruct, inform, entertain, move, arouse, perform, convince and, in general, persuade their audience.
Turn on the television—the media outlets are churning out exhausted sound-bites and featurettes about the past decade. What these retrospectives lack, are analysis. Looking backward is always the best way to look forward, but real dissection in necessary in order to gain any meaningful perspective.
So that’s what this blog is about: essays, mini-essays and articles, critically analyzing significant historic, cultural symbols of this past decade.
Here’s to 2010 and beyond. Stay tuned.
Great idea Justin! I'll be reading along.
ReplyDeleteBut, a point of protocol: the 20th century and 2nd millennium AD/CE ended on December 31, 2000, not December 31, 1999. Centuries and Millenia run from 1-100 (example: 1901-2000) and 1-1000 (example: 2001-3000), respectively. This is because there was no year 0, 1 BC/BCE turned directly to 1 AD/CE.
However, the common way we refer to decades is 0-9. So the naughts/aughts/2000s is correctly over, and your review of the decade is perfectly fine.
It's just that the post title "The End of the First Decade in the 21st Century" is a year early. Sorry to be a stickler, I can't really help myself...
No, you are totally correct (thank you for being a stickler!) and that point is not overlooked. Since we, in 2010, are actually ending the this decade at the end of THIS year...I think the retrospective will work.
ReplyDeleteI seem to remember a Seinfeld where Jerry pointed this out for Newman's scheduled Newmanniun...planned for 2001, instead of 2000.