1980s
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
"Margaret Thatcher (1979) and Ronald Reagan (1980) came to power ending the Trente Glorieuses. Major civil discontent and violence occurred in the Middle East, including the Iran–Iraq War, the Soviet–Afghan War, the 1982 Lebanon War, the Nagorno-Karabakh War, the Bombing of Libya in 1986, and the First Intifada in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Islamism became a powerful political force in the 1980s and many terrorist organizations, including Al Qaeda started."--Sholem Stein |
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The 1980s refers to the period of and between 1980 and 1989. In the United Kingdom particularly, this decade is often referred to as "the Me decade" and "the Greed decade", reflecting the economic and social climate. In the United States and UK, "yuppie" entered the lexicon, referring to the well-publicized rise of a new middle class within the upper economic strata. College graduates in their late 20s/30s were entering the workplace in prestigious office professions, holding more purchasing power in trendy, luxurious goods.
It was also known as "the purple passage of the late 1980s". The Autumn of Nations led towards the withdrawal of Soviet troops at the conclusion of the Soviet-Afghan War, fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of Cold War. The era was characterized by the blend of conservative family values alongside a period of increased telecommunications, shift towards liberal market economies and the new openness of perestroika and glasnost. This transitional passage also saw massive democratic revolutions such as the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 in China, the Czechoslovak velvet revolution, and the overthrow of the dictatorial regime in Romania and other communist Warsaw Pact states in Central and Eastern Europe. These changes continued to be felt in the 1990s and on into the 21st century.
The 1980s was also an era of tremendous population growth around the world, comparable only to the 1970s or 1990s to being among the largest in human history. This growth occurred not only in developing regions but also developed western nations, where many newborns were the offspring of the largely populated Baby Boomers.
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Highlights
- 1980 Dressed to Kill by Brian De Palma
- 1981 first cases of AIDS
- 1982 Ranx 1: Ranx à New-york by Stefano Tamburini/Tanino Liberatore
- 1983 Videodrome by David Cronenberg
- 1984 Apple Macintosh introduced
- 1985 House music: "Mysteries of Love" by Fingers, Inc.
- 1986 Incredibly Strange Films by V. Vale, Andrea Juno
- 1987 The Way Things Go by Peter Fischli & David Weiss
- 1988 Morris worm
- 1989 Europe: Berlin wall falls
Popular culture
The most prominent events and trends in popular culture of the decade include:
Music
The decade saw the emergence of new wave, electronic music (e.g., synthpop) the use of the synthesizer, and the introduction of hip hop and sampling.
The decade began with a backlash against disco music and a movement away from the orchestral arrangements that had characterized much of the music of the 1970s. Music in the 1980s was characterized by electronic sounds accomplished through the use of synthesizers and keyboards, along with drum machines. The music channel MTV began the trend of the music video. The first video to be aired on MTV was Buggles's "Video Killed The Radio Star".
The 1980s saw two new developments, the demise of disco the rise of electronic dance music.
By the late 1970s many major US cities had thriving disco club scenes which were centered around discothèques, nightclubs, and private loft parties where DJs would play disco hits through powerful PA systems for the dancers. Some of the most prestigious clubs had elaborate lighting systems that throbbed to the beat of the music.
The largest world cities like New York (Paradise Garage, The Loft), Manchester (The Haçienda), Paris (Les Bains Douches), Ibiza (Pacha), Antwerp (Ancienne Belgique) played a significant role in the evolution of clubbing, DJ culture and nightlife.
New genres included New Wave, Synthpop, Hip Hop, House, Acid House, Techno, Rave, Freestyle, Electro, Eurodisco, Italo Disco, Hi-NRG, Balearic, jazz-funk, post-disco, Northern soul and 80s groove
Playlists
- Paradise Garage classics
- Ancienne Belgique (Antwerp)
- Liaisons Dangereuses (radio program)
- Towards a Balearic playlist
- Loft classics
Film
The films of the 1980s covered many genres, with hybrids crossing between multiple genres. The trend strengthened towards creating ever-larger blockbuster films, which earned more in their opening weeks than any previous film, due in part to staging releases when audiences had little else to choose.
- Dressed to Kill (1980) by Brian De Palma
- Coup de Torchon (1981) by Bertrand Tavernier
- Q (1982) by Larry Cohen
- Videodrome (1983) by David Cronenberg
- Blood Simple (1984) by Coen Brothers
- Tampopo (1985) by Juzo Itami
- Blue Velvet (1986) by David Lynch
- Amazon Women on the Moon (1987) by Carl Gottlieb, John Landis
- Drowning by Numbers (1988) by Peter Greenaway
- Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989) by Shinya Tsukamoto
Television
MTV was launched in the United States in 1981 and Teletext was introduced.
The 1980s was the decade of transformation in television. Cable television became more accessible and therefore, more popular. By the middle of the decade, almost 70% of the American population had cable television and over 85% were paying for cable services such as HBO or Showtime.
The 1980s was also the period of glory for primetime soap operas such as Dallas and Dynasty.
The popular animated sitcom The Simpsons debuted in 1989. There were also the TV talk shows that were increasing in popularity and some of the most viewed were the ones hosted by Geraldo Rivera or David Letterman.
Video gaming
The 1980s starts the age of the video game. Popular video games include Pac-Man, Super Mario Bros. and Donkey Kong. Handheld Game Boy introduced into the youth market segment.
Fashion
- The kitsch of the 1970s, while itself rejected, influenced the fashion of the 1980s – in the beginning of the decade marked by the New Romantic movement and later by fashion inspired by heavy metal bands, including teased hair, ripped jeans and neon clothing.
Significant fashion trends of the 1980s include:
- Perm, Mullet and Hair gel
- Leggings, Leg warmers
- Shoulder Pads
- Headbands
- Pastel colors
- Ray-Ban sunglasses
- Jean jackets
Miscellaneous
- BMX bicycles gained popularity amongst the youth in the early 1980s.
- The Yo-yo gained popularity amongst the youth in the beginning of the decade as well.
- Fast food chain restaurants such as McDonald's and Burger King experienced a strong increase circulation.
- Rubik's cube became a popular fad throughout the decade.
Literature
- 1980 in literature – John le Carré's Smiley's People; Robert Ludlum's Jason Bourne trilogy; J. M. Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians; William Maxwell's So Long, See You Tomorrow; Anthony Burgess's Earthly Powers; Umberto Eco's Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose); John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces; Gay Talese's Thy Neighbor's Wife; Brian Friel's play Translations first performed; Ken Follett's The Key to Rebecca; Death of Jean-Paul Sartre
- 1981 in literature – Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children; Thomas Harris's Red Dragon; Death of Christy Brown
- 1982 in literature – José Saramago's Memorial do Convento (Baltasar and Blimunda); Alice Walker's The Color Purple; Primo Levi's Se non ora, quando? (If Not Now, When?); L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth; Isabel Allende's La casa de los espíritus (The House of the Spirits); Charles Bukowski's Ham on Rye; Roald Dahl's The BFG; Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing; Fernando Pessoa's The Book of Disquiet; Stephen King's The Gunslinger; David Eddings' The Belgariad; Ken Follett's The Man from St. Petersburg; Death of Philip K. Dick
- 1983 in literature – J. M. Coetzee's Life & Times of Michael K; Salman Rushdie's Shame; Terry Pratchett's Discworld; Parker Brothers and Random House publish the first Care Bears books; Ken Follett's On Wings of Eagles; Norman Mailer's Ancient Evenings; Stephen King's Pet Sematary; Dean Koontz's Phantoms; Lynley Dodd's Hairy Maclary from Donaldson's Dairy; Palanca Awardee's Luha ng Buwaya; Death of Arthur Koestler
- 1984 in literature – Milan Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being; José Saramago's O Ano da Morte de Ricardo Reis (The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis); Richard Harris' play Stepping Out first performed; Don DeLillo's White Noise; Julian Barnes's Flaubert's Parrot; Tom Clancy's The Hunt for Red October; Milorad Pavic's Dictionary of the Khazars; Antonio Tabucchi's Indian Nocturne; Glen Cook's The Black Company; Death of Truman Capote, Michel Foucault
- 1985 in literature – Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale; Gabriel García Márquez's El amor en los tiempos del cólera (Love in the Time of Cholera); Patrick Süskind's Perfume; Carlos Fuentes's The Old Gringo; Chris Van Allsburg's The Polar Express; Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game; Ken Follett's Lie Down with Lions; Death of Italo Calvino
- 1986 in literature
- Fiction
- Nothing Natural by Jenny Diski
- Mirrorshades by Bruce Sterling
- La plus belle paire de seins du monde, a collection of stories by Roland Topor
- Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
- Non-fiction
- Incredibly Strange Films by V. Vale and Andrea Juno
- Lequeu : An Architectural Enigma by Philippe Duboÿ
- Idols of Perversity by Bram Dijkstra
- Non-fiction
- Cut 'n' Mix by Dick Hebdige
- The Fatal Shore by Robert Hughes
- The Secret Museum by Walter Kendrick
- 1988 in literature
- Fiction
- The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
- Bad Behavior by Mary Gaitskill
- Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco
- Non fiction
- The Misfits: A Study of Sexual Outsiders by Colin Wilson
- Fiction
- The Quincunx by Charles Palliser
- London Fields by Martin Amis
- Non-fiction;
- Lipstick Traces, a Secret History of 20th Century by Greil Marcus
- No Respect: Intellectuals and Popular Culture by Andrew Ross
- Hard Core: Power, Pleasure by Linda Williams
- Rants and Incendiary Tracts by Bob Black and Adam Parfrey
- Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity by Richard Rorty
Visual arts
- Codex Seraphinianus (1981) by Luigi Serafini
See also