Ghost of an Idea: Hauntology, Folk Horror & the Spectre of Nostalgia — William Burns

The future ain’t what it used to be.

Is nostalgia revitalizing or killing 21^st-century culture? The concept of nostalgia has seeped into almost all aspects of modern-day media, none more so than horror culture and its borderlands of Hauntology, Folk Horror, and found footage film.

Ghost of an Idea: Hauntology, Folk Horror, and the Spectre of Nostalgia examines the use and effect of nostalgia in the Horror and Hauntological realms. It asks why these genres hold such a fascination in popular culture, often inspiring devoted fanbases. From Candyman to The Blair Witch Project, and Dark Shadows to American Horror Story, are the folk horror and found footage phenomena significant artistic responses to political, social, and economic conditions, or simply an aesthetic rebranding of what has come before? How has nostalgia become linked to other concepts (psychogeography, residual haunting) to influence Hauntological music such as Boards of Canada or The Caretaker? What can the ‘urban wyrd’ or faux horror footage tell us about our idealized past? And how will these cultures of nostalgia shape the future?

Combining the author’s analysis with first-hand accounts of fans and creators, Ghost of an Idea offers a critical analysis of our cultural quest to recognize, resurrect, and lay to rest the ghosts of past and present, also summoning up those spectres that may haunt the future.