Close Encounters of the Common Kind: The Theoretical and Practical Implications of Popular Culture for Modern Greek Studies

Since the mid-1980s Modern Greek Studies has struggled to adapt to a rapidly evolving academic environment that emphasizes postmodernism, poststructuralism, and multiculturalism. The difficulties the field has faced can be traced to a variety of institutional factors: its marginality within the academy, its traditional proximity to both the Greek state and the Greek nation, and the ongoing interrogation of the academy's Eurocentric roots, which has devalued traditional representations of Modern Greece as the contemporary embodiment of the classical past. These institutional problems have been exacerbated by an entrenched critical bias. The field has been unwilling to fully examine popular culture as a site where Greek identity is formed and articulated. Supplementing Modern Greek Studies' current research agenda with a focus on popular culture offers the field the opportunity to renew and revitalize its critical mission by ensconcing the field more fully with the contemporary critical and political moment.