What's Happened To Pop Culture?

Pop culture. For decades, it's been washing across the U.S. like waves on a beach.  Writing in Vanity Fair this month, Kurt Anderson says that, strange as it may seem, the cultural surf stopped around 1990 because we got fixated on the past. Emily Esfahani Smith responds with a resounding "No." She says those waves are still there, but we don't study the past anymore, so what looks like stagnation is really an attempt to "reconnect" with a rich heritage.

Instapundit's Ed Driscoll has a brief observation on this issue as well as links to the above mentioned articles and the phenomenon of  our "present-tense culture."  Makes for some interesting reading for pop culture junkies everywhere. Be sure to read the comments following the Anderson and Smith articles.

Illustration: Untitled from Marilyn Monroe (Marilyn). 1967, Any Warhol. MOMA