Re: Future of '60s courses?

M Bibby (mwbibb@ARK.SHIP.EDU)
Sat, 01 Nov 1997 17:06:30 -0500 (EST)

Sandra raises a point worth pursuing--I am curious about the market for
60s Studies, too.

My gut sense is that it's sorta peaked--there was a moment there in the
early 90s when grunge kids had some interest (maybe the Woodstock II
thing helped stimulate popular interest?), but that now very few seem
interested and identify it with passe boomerism.

The Perspectives on the 60s series for
Rutgers UP (shameless plug: my book *Hearts and Minds: Bodies, Poetry,
and Resistance in the Vietnam Era* came out in this series in 1996) seems
to be going nowhere, even though it's brought out some excellent
scholarship (and I'm not just tooting my own horn here). My editor has
told me that 60s books just aren't selling these days--and I've heard
this from other editors as well. I'd informally proposed putting
together an anthology of 60s activist lit to one editor and she told me
it was a great idea but that it'd never sell. But all this is
anecdotal--I'd be interested in hearing from writers/publishers on the
list about hard numbers--what kind of market #s are we talking about here
when we say 60s books don't sell? And I'd also be interested in anyone's
analysis of the paucity of interest in 60s studies--in particular, why
does the academy remain so indiffernt to 60s scholarship? I can sorta
understand readers getting bored with all the "I was there" narratives
about sex/drugs/rocknroll/politix--but why so little serious
interest among historians, cultural studies folk, lit crits, American
studies folk, African American Studies, postcolonial studies, etc. in
serious scholarship on the period? I tend to think that a lot of it is
generational--there was a big influx of people into academic positions
during the 70s who lived the 60s and aren't really interested in
critically examining what for them was a formative moment intheir
personal development--a lot of the academics just coming up aren't too
interested in examining the period of their immediate predecessors in the
academy. I also think the lack of interest may stem from the overall
sense of nostalgic boomerism many perceive 60s studies to be. But then I
think it might also stem from people's discomfort critically exploring a
period of political turmoil that has fundamentally shaped their own world
views. On the other hand, it might just be simply a matter of
time--we're still too close to the period to adequately study
it--although it was a generation ago. There's scads of stuff out on
early 20th C and late 20th C, post-60s US culture--and very little in
between.

Michael Bibby
Department of English
Shippensburg University
1871 Old Main Drive
Shippensburg, PA 17257
(717) 532-1723
mwbibb@ark.ship.edu