The shorthand term for a set of liberal attitudes about education and society, and the terminology associated with them. To be “politically correct” is to…
Browsing: Fads
Until the early 1960s, the artefacts of our so-called mass culture were never taken seriously by social and cultural critics. More often than not, these…
The pop-top drink can was invented in the early 1970s by Australian designer Mike Debenham, working with the steel company BHP to help eliminate traditional ring-pull…
Protests in the 1960s can be divided into two main categories; those provoked by racial tensions, such as the ghetto riots in the United States,…
In the late 60s, the duffle coats and scarves of yesteryear were replaced by kaftans, beads, bells, velvet loon pants, afro hairstyles, bright military uniforms…
Also known as the bubble skirt or balloon skirt, the puffball skirt was one of the most defining, structurally audacious fashion silhouettes of the 1980s.…
Most of those responsible for the European development of the Quadraphonic stereo system would probably rather forget that they were involved. To say that it…
Cold War America was a hotbed of fear and suspicion of possible Communist infiltrators and spies – known as ‘the enemy within’ – and the…
For any kid attending a British comprehensive school between 1971 and 1977, Richard Allen’s Skinhead books were required reading. ‘Richard Allen’ was actually a pseudonym used by…
Roller Derby was born in Chicago during the Depression but didn’t achieve national prominence until the advent of television in the late 1940s. In 1949,…
Roller skates are an ultimate icon of the 1970s – but the first demonstration of roller skates in Britain actually took place 200 years earlier.…
Ronco is still going today, but its heyday was unquestionably the 1970s, when it churned out a seemingly never-ending range of unnecessary and frankly pointless…
Just three months after the September 1976 punk festival, the Roxy opened in a former gay club called Chaugerama’s at 41-43 Neal Street in London’s…
Professor Erno Rubik was once an Architecture Professor at the Budapest School of Commercial Art in Hungary. Now, however, he is far better known as…
There have been plenty of toys that allowed children to put their natural creative energies to work. Lego, Erector sets, and countless other similar items let kids…
“Saucy” seaside postcards now speak to the humour of a bygone age, but in their heyday, they were found in every seaside town. For generations of…
As the seventies began, the search for self-awareness became an increasingly mainstream concept. After the rampant consumerism of the ’50s and early ’60s, and the…
If you went to see Earthquake (1974) at a cinema, chances are that it was in “Sensurround”. The Sensurround system was designed to envelop the audience with…
No one knew what it was made of – in fact, people still don’t know what it’s made of! Certain cities have banned it, and…
“Imagine a vehicle that can drive you five miles for a penny. A vehicle that needs no petrol – just a battery. And that takes…