Bubble Life: Fetishized home, Authentic Belonging, and the Culture of Booms and Busts

Michelle Chihara
Literature
UC Irvine

Beginning with the real estate bubble in Los Angeles in the late 1880s and Helen Hunt Jackson’s novel Ramona, this project explored the historically specific feedback loops created between the culture and the economy. This project examined cultural narratives in light of the accounts at work in the market, with a special focus on Southern California’s role in the both the economy, literature, and media.

Every economic bubble tells a particular story. Working with theoretical accounts of economic performativity, journalistic accounts of the recent boom and bust, and cultural theorists working with key concepts like nostalgia and the poetics of space, this dissertation explored how specific novels and popular media both affected and were affected by the economy. The project interweaved journalistic research with readings of contemporary American fiction dealing explicitly with home, credit, and debt.