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I'm finally giving an author reading / lecture about metamodernism and my book here in Seattle, at the fabulous FOLIO ATHENAEUM (a membership library) in Pike Place Market! It's a Sunday afternoon when parking downtown is free! The event itself is free too, with the (absolutely optional) option of making a donation to Folio. RSVP to save a spot, here.https://www.folioseattle.org/event-details/say-hello-to-metamodernism-with-greg-dember
I'll read from my book, SAY HELLO TO METAMODERNISM! And there will be an audio-visual presentation, with examples drawn from music and film and I’ll do some additional ‘splainin not drawn from the pages of the book, and I’m hoping for a robust discussion.
From the back of the book:
SAY HELLO TO METAMODERNISM offers a guided tour of one of the newer “isms” on the block, metamodernism – the cultural period many say began emerging around the turn of the millennium, after postmodernism had lost much of its charm. By emphasizing qualities such as individual felt experience, and by braiding playful irony and experimentation with an unabashed delight in the intricacies of being human, metamodern artworks both reflect and help generate a new cultural sensibility. To understand it is to come to understand something about ourselves in today’s world.
Within these pages, Greg Dember weaves his own encounters with society’s shifting sensibilities into an exploration of metamodernist works by musicians such as SUFJAN STEVENS, ELLIOTT SMITH, and BILLIE EILISH; by filmmakers like MIRANDA JULY, WES ANDERSON, and GRETA GERWIG; by novelists such as DAVE EGGERS, ELIF BATUMAN, and TOPE FOLARIN; and in television shows such as BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, BOJACK HORSEMAN and ATLANTA, while also considering how the metamodern sensibility is expressed in contemporary developments in religion and philosophy. Dember writes in a thoughtful, engaging style that is effective both at making academic concepts accessible to arts fans and artists themselves, and at introducing original ideas about metamodernism to scholars.
Praise for the book:
Greg Dember has long struck me as one of the most perceptive and eloquent critics of contemporary culture. To see his observations and ideas come together in book form to theorize its most prevalent logic, metamodernism, is an exciting event. I doubt you’ll find a more cohesive popular introduction to the films you’ve been seeing, the music you’ve listened to and the books that you’ve pretended at parties to have read, and the figures and sensibilities which unite them, than this. Or, indeed, a more fun one, for this book, packed with original insights and thoughts, is a joy from beginning to end. A superb achievement.
- Timotheus Vermeulen, PhD, Professor of Media, Culture and Society at the University of Oslo, Co-editor of Metamodernism: Historicity, Affect and Depth After Postmodernism
In Say Hello to Metamodernism!, Greg Dember investigates a noticeable shift in pop culture, beginning in the early 2000s, a move from postmodern wryness to something... else. Earnest, yet ironic; mythic, yet tiny. By distilling potentially opaque concepts into accessible prose through examples spanning cult films like Miranda July’s Me and You and Everyone We Know and blockbuster musical acts like Billie Eilish, Dember offers a fun and fascinating primer for our cultural moment.
- Maren Haynes Marchesini, PhD, Director of Worship & Music at Hope Lutheran Church in Bozeman, Montana
Greg Dember uncovers the contours of that ‘new thing’ we can feel in movies, music, TV, and philosophy but haven’t quite been able to name. Understanding metamodernism is essential for understanding what’s really going on under the skin of some of our time’s most influential media, and Dember by introducing us, gives us a better and clearer understanding of our current cultural moment.
- Thomas Flight, Youtube Influencer, Video Essayist on Film and Television
Combining personal reflection, historical research, and pop culture analysis, Greg Dember’s Say Hello to Metamodernism illuminates how our current cultural moment has been shaped by metamodernism’s drive for authentic human expression that resists both the saccharine and the cynical. The result is a book that is as invested in providing a groundwork for thinking about cultural history, as it is committed to offering an ambitious defense of the intellectual and emotional worth of feeling things strongly.
- Arielle Bernstein, MFA, Senior Professorial Lecturer in Literature, American University
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Folio: The Seattle Athenaeum, Eat Seattle, 1433 1st Ave, Seattle, WA 98101, United States
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups - all the happenings, one place.
