{"title":"Gary S Cross","description":"\u003cp\u003eExplore the fascinating works of Gary S. Cross, delving into the social history of consumer culture, childhood, and leisure. Perfect for readers interested in cultural studies and historical analysis.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"time-and-money-book-gary-s-cross-9780415088558","title":"Time and Money","description":"New mass production methods after World War I intensified the debate over the allocation of growth in the advanced industrial societies, resulting eventually in a new balance of production and consumption as the routine of the 40 hour week and the annual holiday became the norm. Gary Cross provides a comparative and wide-ranging historical analysis of the work-and-spend ethic, exploring American, British and French patterns of organizing free time. Covering the emergence of a consumer society in the 1920s and 30s, through the mass consumerism of the 1950s to trends in the present day, he provides a new perspective on the history of consumerism by placing contemporary dilemmas and responses to the question of `time and money' in their historical context. He links the modern culture of consumerism with trends in work, leisure, cultural politics and political economy to create a subtle analysis of complex social phenomena.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49634517713169,"sku":"GOR012138087","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0415088550.jpg?v=1751071816"},{"product_id":"freak-show-legacies-book-gary-s-cross-9781350145122","title":"Freak Show Legacies","description":"Society has long been fascinated with the freakish, shocking and strange. In this book Gary Cross shows how freakish elements have been embedded in modern popular culture over the course of the 20th century despite the evident disenchantment with this once widespread cultural outlet. Exploring how the spectacle of freakishness conflicted with genteel culture, he shows how the condemnation of the freak show by middle-class America led to a transformation and merging of genteel and freak culture through the cute, the camp and the creepy.   Though the carnival and circus freak was marginalised by the 1960s and had largely disappeared by the 1980s, forms of freakish culture survived and today appear in reality TV, horror movies, dark comedies and the popularity of tattoos. Freak Show Legacies will focus less on the individual ‘freak’ as ‘the other’ in society, and more on the audience for the freakish and the transformation of wonder, sensibility and sensitivity that this phenomenon entailed. It will use the phenomenon of ‘the freak’ to understand the transformation of American popular culture across the 20th century, identify elements of ‘the freak’ in popular culture both past and present, and ask how it has prevailed despite its apparent unpopularity.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49738282893585,"sku":"NGR9781350145122","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50373436899601,"sku":"CIN1350145122G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1350145122.jpg?v=1751336195"},{"product_id":"kids-stuff-book-gary-s-cross-9780674898301","title":"Kids' Stuff","description":"To sort out who's who and what's what in the world of Barbies and Ninja Turtles, Tinkertoys and teddy bears, is to begin to see what has become of childhood in America. It is this changing world, and what it unveils about Americans values, that Gary Cross explores in this book, a look into the meaning of American toys through this century. Early in the 1900s toys reflected parents ideas about children and their futures. Erector sets introduced boys to a realm of business and technology, while baby dolls anticipated motherhood and building blocks honed the fine motor skills of the youngest children. The book chronicles the transformation that occurred as the interests and intentions of parents, children, and the toy industry gradually diverged starting in the 1930s when toymakers, inspired by popular favorites like Shirley Temple and Buck Rogers, began to appeal directly to the young. TV advertising, blockbuster films like \"Star Wars\", and Saturday morning cartoons exploited their youthful audience. Meanwhile, social and economic forces were transforming the nature of play in American society. Cross offers an account of a culture in which erector sets and baby dolls are no longer alone in preparing children for the future, and in which the toys that now crowd the racks are as perplexing for parents as they are beguiling for little boys and girls. Whether we want our children to be high achievers in a competitive world or playful and free from the worries of adult life, the toy store confronts us with many choices. What does the endless array of action figures and fashion dolls mean? Are children or parents the dupes of the film, television, and toy industries, with their latest fads and fantasies? What does this say about our time, and what does it bode for our future? Tapping a vein of cultural history, the book exposes the serious business behind a century of playthings.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50266572980497,"sku":"CIN0674898303VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":50359956177169,"sku":"CIN0674898303A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51210249502993,"sku":"GOR014199974","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51416075895057,"sku":"CIN0674898303G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":53161411117329,"sku":"GOR014789194","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":53161634988305,"sku":"GOR006138072","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0674898303.jpg?v=1751008352"},{"product_id":"packaged-pleasures-book-gary-s-cross-9780226121277","title":"Packaged Pleasures","description":"From the candy bar to the cigarette, records to roller coasters, a technological revolution during the last quarter of the nineteenth century precipitated a colossal shift in human consumption and sensual experience.  Food, drink, and many other consumer goods came to be mass-produced, bottled, canned, condensed, and distilled, unleashing new and intensified surges of pleasure, delight, thrill - and addictions.  In Packaged Pleasures, Gary S. Cross and Robert N. Proctor delve into an unchartered chapter of American history, shedding new light on the origins of modern consumer culture and how technologies have transformed human sensory experience.  In the space of only a few decades, junk foods, cigarettes, movies, recorded sound, and thrill rides brought about a revolution in what it means to taste, smell, see, hear, and touch.  New techniques of boxing, labeling, and tubing gave consumers virtually unlimited access to pleasures they could simply unwrap and enjoy. Manufacturers generated a seemingly endless stream of sugar-filled, high-fat foods that were delicious but detrimental to health.  Mechanically rolled cigarettes entered the market and quickly addicted millions. And many other packaged pleasures dulled or displaced natural and social delights. Yet many of these same new technologies also offered convenient and effective medicines, unprecedented opportunities to enjoy music and the visual arts, and more hygienic, varied, and nutritious food and drink. For better or for worse, sensation became mechanized, commercialized, and, to a large extent, democratized by being made cheap and accessible. Cross and Proctor have delivered an ingeniously constructed history of consumerism and consumer technology that will make us all rethink some of our favorite things.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50275289858321,"sku":"GOR012540653","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50285361430801,"sku":"GOR008111205","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50500311974161,"sku":"CIN0226121275G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50953658827025,"sku":"CIN0226121275VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0226121275.jpg?v=1751037607"},{"product_id":"free-time-book-gary-s-cross-9781479813070","title":"Free Time","description":"2024 Outstanding Academic Title, given by Choice Reviews    The history of leisure time, from the earliest societies to the work-from-home era  Free time, one of life's most precious things, often feels unfulfilling. But why? And how did leisure activities transition from strolling in the park for hours to \"doomscrolling\" on social media for thirty minutes?  Today, despite the promise of modern industrialization, many people experience both a scarcity of free time and a disappointment in it. Free Time offers a broad historical explanation of why our affluent society does not afford more time away from work and why that time is often unsatisfying. Gary S. Cross explores the cultural, social, economic, and political history, especially of the past 250 years to understand the roots of our conceptions of free time and its use. By the end of the nineteenth century, a common expectation was that industrial innovations would lead to a progressive reduction of work time and a subsequent rise in free time devoted to self-development and social engagement. However, despite significant changes in the early twentieth century, both goals were frustrated, thus leading to the contemporary dilemma.  Cross touches on leisure of all kinds, from peasant festivals and aristocratic pleasure gardens to amusement parks, movie theaters and organized sports to internet surfing, and even the use of alcohol and drugs. This wide-ranging cultural and social history explores the industrial-era origins of our modern obsession with work and productivity, but also the historical efforts to liberate time from work and cultivate free time for culture. Insightful and informative, this book is sure to help you make sense of your own relationship to free time.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50385442210065,"sku":"CIN1479813079G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51028686045457,"sku":"NIN9781479813070","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52136039186705,"sku":"NLS9781479813070","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1479813079.jpg?v=1751148227"},{"product_id":"freak-show-legacies-book-gary-s-cross-9781350145139","title":"Freak Show Legacies","description":"Society has long been fascinated with the freakish, shocking and strange. In this book Gary Cross shows how freakish elements have been embedded in modern popular culture over the course of the 20th century despite the evident disenchantment with this once widespread cultural outlet. Exploring how the spectacle of freakishness conflicted with genteel culture, he shows how the condemnation of the freak show by middle-class America led to a transformation and merging of genteel and freak culture through the cute, the camp and the creepy.   Though the carnival and circus freak was marginalised by the 1960s and had largely disappeared by the 1980s, forms of freakish culture survived and today appear in reality TV, horror movies, dark comedies and the popularity of tattoos. Freak Show Legacies will focus less on the individual ‘freak’ as ‘the other’ in society, and more on the audience for the freakish and the transformation of wonder, sensibility and sensitivity that this phenomenon entailed. 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