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Is This Video Cool?

2015-08-07 · letter vlog · Hank · 3:50 · watch on YouTube

Topic: History & curiosities · mode: Personal essay · tags: self promotion

Hank argues that the many, fast-changing words for 'cool' show culture defining itself, that these words mostly come from marginalized cultures and are co-opted by the mainstream in a kind of colonization, and that we should examine that process.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Hank's obsession with the word 'cool': words for culture's ever-changing leading edge

  • ★★★ Hank says he has an unhealthy obsession with the word 'cool' — not the concept but the words used for the mutable mix of embodying, defying and defining culture. — 00:00:00 · cool
  • ★★ Hank says cool and its neighbouring words try to define the leading edge of culture's aesthetic, an edge out of everyone's control because everyone controls it. — 00:00:15 · cool
  • ★★★ Hank argues culture needs new words as it changes, because old words define an old culture, and faster change produces more of them. — 00:00:29

00:00:38 — 'Drunk' as the English word with most synonyms (Franklin); a long list of words for cool

  • ★★ Hank says it is widely accepted that 'drunk' is the English word with the most synonyms, first proposed, he thinks, by Benjamin Franklin — hard to argue with mainly because slang is hard to measure. (hedged) — 00:00:38
  • ★★ Hank thinks 'cool' could give 'drunk' a run for its money, listing dozens of synonyms from dope and rad to the cat's pajamas and on fleek. (playful, hedged) — 00:00:48 · cool

00:01:08 — Culture defines words and words define culture; culture's shallow, mirror-like self-awareness; cool as a place to examine it

  • ★★★ Hank says culture defines the words and the words define the culture; the very concept of cool requires a kind of cultural self-awareness. — 00:01:08 · cool
  • ★★★ Hank argues culture is self-aware only superficially, like looking in a mirror and being impressed, rather than examining its motivations, effects, hopes and fears as a person reflecting would. (hedged) — 00:01:21
  • ★★ Hank says one way to examine culture is through the choices it makes, and cool, 'that bleeding edge of the collective self', is a good place to look. (hedged) — 00:01:58 · cool

00:02:10 — Where words for cool come from: 60s, surfers, subcultures, marginalized cultures, 1880s African American English; mainstream co-option as colonization; our obligation

  • ★★ Hank says 1960s focus on space exploration and drug culture gave words like 'far out', 'out of this world' and 'gone'; surfer culture, about enthusiasm rather than aloofness, gave 'mondo', 'bodacious' and 'radical'. — 00:02:10
  • ★★★ Hank says these words almost always reach the mainstream from a subculture — rock and roll, punk, beat poets — but most commonly from marginalized cultures. — 00:02:24
  • ★★ Hank says the first use of 'cool' for the concept of coolness has been traced to the 1880s in African-American English. — 00:02:33 · cool

  • ★★★ Hank says the mainstream often co-opts and redefines these words, a kind of colonization of the cool of marginalized cultures that the mainstream itself marginalized. — 00:02:41

    “a kind of colonization of the cool of marginalized cultures that the mainstream has itself marginalized”

  • ★★★ Hank says diversity creates opportunities for cultural advancement, but the wave can be destructive if we forget we built it and don't question its effects. — 00:02:51

  • ★★★ Hank says we get to decide what cool is; we both create and are created by culture, so maybe we have an obligation to inspect the wave, its motivations and effects. (hedged) — 00:03:01

00:03:18 — Sign-off; plea for productive comment discussion; Welcome to Night Vale shows; NerdCon: Stories tickets

  • ★★ Hank pleads for productive discussion in the comments, since there was much he couldn't say in the time. — 00:03:20
  • ★★ Hank will perform with Welcome to Night Vale in Portland and Seattle on October 27th and 28th. — 00:03:31 · also in: Awkward Stranger Conversations
  • ★★ NerdCon: Stories is still happening October 9th and 10th in Minneapolis; since VidCon they have been planning it, and most but not all tickets are sold. — 00:03:35 · VidCon

In the description and comments

  • ★★ In the description Hank recommends a Reddit linguistics discussion of when and how slang becomes cultural appropriation as one of the best he has seen. — video description · Reddit

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: cool · cultural appropriation · social exclusion

Also: People: Benjamin Franklin

Projects: NerdCon: Stories · VidCon

Works: Welcome to Night Vale

Groups: Beat Generation

Concepts: African-American English · colonialism · English language · punk subculture · rock and roll · slang · surf culture

Places: Minneapolis · Portland, Oregon · Seattle

Only in the description or credits: Reddit

Also centred on cultural appropriation: Screwing Up: Two Stories From When I Worked at a TV Station

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