Fabricating the Absolute Fake: America in Contemporary Pop Culture

From the pageantry of Oprah Winfrey€™s daytime talk show to the Atlanta-based Coca-Cola empire, American €œpop€ culture€”and the contemporary films, television programs, and cultural objects that determine it€”dominates the rest of the world through its hegemonic presence. Does that make everyone a hybridized American or do these elements find mediation within the other cultures that consume them? Fabricating the Absolute Fake applies elements of postmodern theory€”Jean Baudrillard€™s hyperreality and Umberto Eco€™s €œabsolute fake€, among others€”to this globally mediated American pop culture in order to examine both the phenomenon itself and its specific appropriation in the Netherlands, as evidenced by diverse cultural icons like the Elvis-inspired crooner Lee Towers, the Moroccan-Dutch white rapper Ali B, musical tributes to an assassinated politician, and the Dutch reality soap opera scene.