The "fairest" of the fairs : a history of fairs, amusement parks, and theme parks

176 Pages·2004·2.41 MB·English

by  Botterill, Jackie.

THE "FAIREST" OF THE FAIRS:
A HISTORY OF FAIRS, AMUSEMENT PARKS,
AND THEME PARKS
Jackie Botterill
BA Simon Fraser University 1993
THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS
in the School of Communication
O Jackie Botterill
Simon Fraser University
July 1997
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APPROVAL
, .
Jacqueline Bonerill
DEGREE:
TITLE: THE "FAIREST" OF THE FAIRS: A HISTORY OF FAIRS,
AMUSEMENT PARKS, AND THEME PARKS.
I
CHAIR: Prof. Par Howard
r
of. Catherine Murray
enior Supervisor
School of Communication. SFU
Prof. Rlchard Gruneau
Supervisor
School of Communicat~on.S FU
Prof Beverley Pitman
GeogrBphy. SIT
Date:
ABSTRACT
Disney theme parks provide a window from which to view contemporary culture. They
draw millions of visitors; accumulate large sums of capital; employ thousands; are
replicated in several locations; and are connected to other media and recreational pursuits.
Yet for all their cultural significance, the parks prove difficult to evaluate. For some they
are holy lands; for others fire and brimstone.
Cultural theorist Raymond Williams argues that cultural forms, such as Disney
theme parks, are best understood within social historic context. The family tree of the
theme park stretches back to pre-modern fairs and carnivals. These community-produced
celebrations combined feasting, processions, competitions, plays and acts of symbolic
reversal in a ritual, that literary theorist Mikhail Bakhtin argues, articulated the
rejuvenating powers of nature. The carnival came under attack and began to be
commodified in the early modem period as the powers of the church and monarchy were
eroded by the rising merchant class. During these changing social relations, some
fairground cultural practises died, while others hived off to operate on their own. New
practises were spawned; and old practises were retextualized. At the turn of the century,
the fair was reintegrated within the modem amusement park. Orchestrated by
entertainment entrepreneurs and architects, these sites "manufactured carnival" by
employing mechanical rides, simulating spaces, and mocking genteel culture through risque
symbolic and practise. Unable to historically adapt, amusement parks were soon
displaced by theme parks in the post-war period. Produced by an animator and
influenced by film and Hollywood, Disney theme parks cleaned up old fair conventions
for middle class tastes, surrendered the entire environment to motif, increased
merchandizing and forged synergies with other media~leisure/tourists ervices.
While Disney World and its other manifestations are presently considered "the
fairest" of the fairs, the past illustrates that theme parks actually reduce the number of
cultural practises which once animated the fairground. This thesis argues that Disney
theme parks claim ownership of historic fairground innovations; privatize public symbols
and practises; destroy original spaces to produce fantastical reproductions for profit;
restrict interaction and discourse to facilitate audience flow and conformity; disguise
multiplicity as diversity; and squeeze out competition. The conservative visions of the
past and future represented by Disney theme parks are neither static nor inevitable. The
Disney corporation is a behemoth, subject to internal conflict and external competition.
Disney must continually negotiate its position with the public. Local groups have
successfully challenged Disney7sr ight to colonize their space. Alternatives may be found
in communities who keep the spirit of carnival alive through "producing" their own public
celebratory rituals.
Dedication
For Lorraine and Public Dreams
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Approval
Abstract
Dedication
Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION
Contribution to the Literature
Beyond 'Distory'
Two Foci
Meanings produced for
Meanings produced by
Synthesis of Two Foci
Raymond Williams
Additional Perspectives
Overview of Chapters
PRE-MODERN AMUSEMENTSCAPE: FAIRS/CARNIVAL
Fairs
Carnival
Carnival Elements
Sustenance
Pigs
Procreation
Struggle
Procession, Competition and Play
Theatre
St. Bartholomew's Fair: Form and Content
Perspectives of the Fair
From the castle
From the street
From the Street Revised: Carnival Critiques
From the market
EARLY MODERN FAIRGROUND TRANSITION
-
Decline of the Noble Rise of the Bourgeoisie
Reformation, Reading, And The Thinning Of Carnival
Literacy
vii
Bourgeoisie
Protestant Ethic(s)
Fairground Fragmentation and Spawning 5 1
Flight to Curative Landscapes
Gardens
Sea-side resort
Finding Indoor Respectability
Theatre
Authorship
Audience
Theatre content
Mobilizing: Clowns and Nationalistic Dramas
Pre-Circus: Hippodrama
Circus
The Wild West
Carnival Redefined
Civil holidays and Country Fairs
Conclusion 70
MASS LEISURE: WORLD'S FAIRS AND AMUSEMENT PARKS 73
World's Fairs
The Chicago World's Fair
Amusement Parks 78
Coney Island
Extending the Eye: Simulated Landscapes and Side-shows
Extending Sensations: Mechanical Rides
FROM AMUSEMENT PARK TO THEME PARK
Post-War Social Landscape (1945-1973) 96
Theme parks
Pre-Disneyland
Disneyland
Early Walt Disney World: Profit, Exclusivity, Prototype Community?
Late-Modernity: Shifting Surfaces (1973-1990s)
Late-Walt Disney World: Expansion and Synergy
The Disney Corporation: Theme park Colonization and Theme park Resistance 133
Colonization 133
Resistance 139
SYNTHESIS 145
Gathering Historical Processes
Cultural Creation
Commodification
viii
Regulation 151
Disney's Contribution to the Amusementscape
Beyond the Walls
Bibliography
Introduction
The Disney theme parks present a very positive view
of the past ... a past which never really existed.
Alan Bryman
Exchange, interdependence, the struggle for power ...h ave been hidden or banished.
Alexander Wilson
This work seeks to evaluate Disney's model of the contemporary theme park by tracing its
genealogy. My goal is to better understand what theme parks are, what they have been, what they
might have been, what they displaced, and why they exist.
Across time and space, people have created a place within which they gathered in large
numbers to participate in ritual, entertainment, amusements, and spectacles, while consuming and
exchanging foods, goods and services. The theme park is the contemporary manifestation of fairs,
carnivals, and amusement parks - a class of cultural phenomena which I will refer to as the
amusementscape. The amusementscape, like landscape, is a physical space and has appeared at the
seaside, the field, the suburb, the city, as well as other material places. It is also an icon, or image
which is rendered within the written word, on the artists' canvas, as well as a multitude of surfaces.
Mikhail Bakhtin's (1984) anaylsis of the carnival draws upon this iconic layer, for he formulated his
thesis upon the way carnival was rendered within the novels of Rabelais'. The suffix "scape" as
Peters has identified, "posits the presence of a unifying principle which enables us to consider part of
the countryside or sea as a unity (but) not the world we see". In this view, the amusementscape is a
"social construction, a composition of the world", as well as a perspective on the world (1948: 2).
Appaduria (1 99 1) has noted five dimentions of globalization: ethnoscapes, technoscapes,
financescapes, mediascapes, and ideoscapes. This work posits a sixth: the amusementscape, cutting
across them all as a constellation of cultural practices over time.
The amusementscape changes over time in relation to broader social relations.
Amusementscape is a social tableau and a unique play space unto itself which can influence other
social practises. This duality makes for a interesting object of study, for the amusementscape is both
immanent and transcendent - both material and imaginary. What unites the fair, carnival, or theme