Time Travel as Living History: Exploring the Media Representation and Sensual Experience of Historical Everyday Life
Time Travel as Living History: Exploring the Media Representation and Sensual Experience of Historical Everyday Life
Abstract
Audiovisual time travel is not restricted to fiction productions, for it can also be found in non-fiction programming. When the Living History format appeared on the international television market in the early 2000s, it was already an established practice in museum education. A group of volunteers travel back in time to a historical period. They act and learn, fail and succeed, not only for themselves but also for the viewers. The programmes are based on the coupling of past and present: during the time-travel experiment the volunteers remain people of their own time and reflect on the historical living conditions from today’s perspective. This article explores the nature of time travel within Living History and how everyday life, values, and norms of the present as well as images of the past are discussed within this framework. Contemporary ideas of historical life have expanded and changed with each representation and interpretation. So, does time travel take place only in our imagination of the past? And what effect does it have on the present? The following productions are analysed here: THE 1900 HOUSE (Channel4, GB 1999), FRONTIER HOUSE (PBS/Channel4, US 2002), SCHWARZWALDHAUS 1902 – LEBEN WIE VOR 100 JAHREN (SWR, DE 2001).
Citation
Copy Citation
BibTex
Except where otherwise noted, this item's license is described as:
Creative Commons - Namensnennung - Nicht kommerziell - Weitergabe unter gleichen Bedingungen
Creative Commons - Namensnennung - Nicht kommerziell - Weitergabe unter gleichen Bedingungen
Keywords:
Living HistoryTime TravelReality-TVUtopia