Joel Dinerstein

writer & professor
race, music & cool

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On being a Brooklyn Jewish Working-Class Kid in the '70s

December 08, 2016

I have a short essay on my upbringing -- "The Lost World of Jewish Flatbush" -- in Rebecca Solnit's Nonstop Metropolis (Joshua Jelly-Schapiro, co-editor). I'm honored to be in this resplendent collection of maps and essay, the first work to successfully reconceptualize and reorient NYC towards its future within a comprehensive 5-borough approach. My organic understanding of cool as a concept comes from growing up during white flight in '70s Flatbush in multi-cultural, multi-ethnic public schools that were more than three-quarters Black, Latino, and Asian. Cool was then a mode of survival, style, integrity, autonomy, and self-presentation --the opposite of superficial popularity, hip irony, or product placement.

Joel Dinerstein is the author of three books on cool, including the first history of the concept (The Origins of Cool in Postwar America), the first major exhibit of cool icons (American Cool), and a corporate history, Coach: A Story of NY Cool. My TED Talk, entitled "Why Cool Matters," can be found on YouTube. I am also the author of the award-winning Swinging the Machine, a theory of swing-era jazz and technology, and Jazz: A Quick Immersion, a short history and listening guide.

I am a cultural historian and Professor of English at Tulane University, and hold a Ph.D in American Studies from the University of Texas @ Austin.

In 2014, I curated the exhibit American Cool at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC. American Cool featured 100 cool icons and 100 photographs, and it was based on my historical research.