There is a constant in the average American's imagination and taste...

There is a constant in the average American's imagination and taste, for which the past must be preserved and celebrated in full-scale 'authentic' copy; a philosophy of immortality as duplication.

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Not saying much

What

Also theres 300 million americans in the most ethnically and culturally diverse cunt on earth. There is no "average american"

What's wrong with wax museums?

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It dominates the relation with the self, wth the past, and not infrequently with the present, always with History and, even, the European (or other) tradition

Most Americans have this same ethos
You can visit the home of most middle age relations and see their own little "private museums" shoved off into some corner room where you can't touch everything and they are filled with antiques and other symbolic representations of the past.
For young people it's no different, just look at these shrines people build to their "Fandom"

Umberto eco said it, it relates to the dominant American mentality that everything must be a perfect replication of the past to be authentic. It's like photorealism in art taken right down to the cultural roots
There are other counter-currents among the more elite of America (as well as true European-Americans) but these are the minority

Not really. Wax replicas do not represent authenticity

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They attempt to, to represent "true" reality and become hyperreal even beyond the efforts of photorealists
People in America like no where else are absolutely obsessed with the authentic, yes are also a democratic people thus the authentic real should be mass produceable

Literally no idea what you're talking about

That's an oxymoron, authenticity and reproduction.

That's the point, in claiming to be authentic due to the precision of the imitation, Americans create a sort of holographic reality for themselves that can and is becoming increasingly detached from anything actually real

That's what he's pointing out. The oxymoron of American culture. You could argue this is an off-shoot of the discussion that started here.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Work_of_Art_in_the_Age_of_Mechanical_Reproduction

The state people go to to hate on Americans. Wow lad, I'm glad I'm not from whatever shithole country OP is from.

It is it's own meta-reality. The Hyper-Reality as defined by Baudrillard.

Well no. Americans are not more lacking in real than any other.

what

Yes

Dude Americans own nice things with sentimental value! haha what a bunch of idiots!

It's not that people have sentiment towards object (Japanese believe that when an object becomes old enough it gains a soul)
It's the obsession to duplicate everything, every experience and though.
It also leads them to hoard things and become dustbins of ideals

Where do you get these ideas

It is a combination two things: the cult of (the importance) of self and the individual, in that every individual believes their every experience is worthy of note but also the obsession with order, analysis, recording and taxonomy.

Both have their roots in the Enlightenment era principles upon which the States were founded.

Reading a book talking about this so I posted a quote about Americans I found interesting consid king my experiences with them

Individual importance (as if every common man deserves the genuine pure article) but the democratic idea as well
In the European past Lords would have these collections of trinkets and heirlooms from the distant past, skilled craftsmen, or far off lands.
The coke bottle memorabilia collection or shrine to Elvis is the democratic middle American equivalent of this

>obsession with order, analysis, recording and taxonomy.

Nothing to do with enlightenment, it's just OCPD which is very common among Germanic protestants.

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For asians, africans and everyone else too
Antiques and celebrating your family are ancient traditions almost universal to everyone else

The difference is in the replication,
For other peoples they have the original or else don't pretend the copy is anything more
For Americans there is a quest for immortality of self and of ideals though perfect replication

I don't think that this is true. Elements of it seem to ring true (obsession with authenticity) but the whole "perfect reproduction" element doesn't really make sense to me. You referenced Coke and Elvis memorabilia, but those are not terribly common pastimes. As far as a "museum" is reproduced objects I have no idea what you are talking about.

its not about the collection but rather the multiplication of reality and claims of authenticity and thus origionality and uniqueness
Think of the can of coke, it claims to be the "real genuine thing" by its own marketing but how can one can be as genuine as another? Or a can verses a bottle verses from a fountain? They don't even all taste the same
This is the illusion and the holographic reality ( an example of it)

Another is in TV of film, an American production would portray a reproduction as being the genuine act, while a European one would make it clear than this is just a reenactment and should be held as separate from the genuine even if t symbolically represents it

shut up gook

go eat napalm

I should also say Asians are bad about this too, though in a different way (except Chinese have copied Americans in making little Disneyland versions of other areas around the world)
in Asian instead there is a myth of permanence and incorruptibility in duplication, by using the same forms and symbols (like in architecture) there is an illusion of timelessness and thus history is rendered moot due to ambiguity

Obsession with "being cultured" without understanding what culture is.

Post your book and other interesting ones