1900-1916
At first, the American Dream was being used to “articulate a collective national ideal” and stopping the rich and powerful from destroying the collective ideals of democratic equality.
Today, many Americans envision the American Dream as golden, sparkling return to the past (national prosperity and so-called harmony)
Being rich is now synonymous for “making it” and living the purest form of the American Dream.
“At the beginning of of the twentieth century, thanks to the explosion of advertising, the rise of celebrity culture, the use of photographs in newspapers and the imminent dominance of Hollywood in the American imagination, consumer capitalism–which included the ‘fashion and home magazines’–was becoming aspirational: ‘the universal American dream and hope’. (pg 30)