JUST ONE WORD: PLASTICS
American Plastic: A Cultural History Try to imagine your world without plastic. It's not easy to do. While other materials could be substituted for plastic in some objects -- eyeglasses, for instance, could be made of glass and metal just as they were for centuries -- some things, like nylons, film, and compact discs -- simply wouldn't exist. Where did this wonder material come from? How has it changed our lives? American Plastic: A Cultural History, by Jeffrey L. Meikle, explores the discovery of plastic, its production, distribution, use, and symbolic influence on style and popular imagination from the 1870's to the present day. This winner of the 1996 Dexter Prize from the Society for the History of Technology and a 1996 Choice Outstanding Academic Book is now available in paperback from Rutgers University Press. In little more than a century, plastic has spread through the material world, moving from almost no presence at all to near ubiquity. American Plastic probes plastic in the post-World War II era as production and demand for this new material exploded, leading to innumerable criticisms of its environmental destruction and artistic superficiality.

For more information, contact Rutgers University Press, Livingston Campus, P.O. Box 5062, New Brunswick, NJ 08903-5062, 732-445-7762.