hipster

Thoughts After Writing a Book

Brett McCracken — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 08:47:34 -0700

In the year 2000, I wrote a list of goals for myself. Life goals. They included such things as traveling across the world, writing music, working at Disney World for a time, and opening a “small, elegant eatery.” Number 6 on the list was “write a book.”

It was around this time last year—the first week in August—when I was sitting at a computer at a hostel in London, checking email frantically before my 30-minutes-for-1-pound window closed. I got an email from an editor at Baker Books who had been interested in my proposal about a book on hip Christianity. The subject of the email was “Good news.”

A year has now gone by. And quite the year it was. I mailed off the manuscript for Hipster Christianity this afternoon—283 pages, 79,000 words. It was a year that took me on amazing research trips to Seattle, Grand Rapids, Chicago, New York, Oxford, London, and Paris. It was a year that found me writing more constantly (like, every spare moment) on one topic than I’d ever done before. It was a year that took a lot out of me personally, spiritually, physically. But it was a good year. I wrote a book that I’m proud of. A book that was sometimes hard to write and sometimes seemed to write itself.

Now that it’s done (at least the first manuscript), I feel excited, relieved, tired, renewed. But mostly I just feel humbled. I still can’t believe I was given the chance to write this book. I’m still pinching myself that I got to write part of it at C.S. Lewis’ desk in Oxford. I thank God for entrusting this project to me and I pray—I PRAY—that what I say in the book leads the church to a productive place of questioning, considering, and defining its identity in the 21st century.

As I write in the Introduction, my motivation in writing the book is not to position myself as some sort of expert or to make some audacious claim about anything, but simply because I love Christianity and I love the church. She is the bride of Christ. I want to see her thrive, expand, and be all that she can be for the world. I want to see the cause of Christ advanced and not muddled up. And this topic—the relationship of the church to the notion of “cool”—strikes me as a vitally important thing that needs to be addressed with tenderness, nuance, and—when appropriate—constructive rebuke.

I’ve always viewed this book as a gift—as something I didn’t think I’d get to do and yet got to do. I’ve always felt like it was a book that needed to be written by someone and that things just happened to come together in the right way so that I could be that someone. It just floors me.

So yeah. The book is written. It’s now going to be edited and doubtless revised over the next few months. If all goes well, it should be on schedule for an August 2010 release.

Thanks for listening and offering feedback along the way. I look forward to the book’s release and all the conversations that will ensue. This exploration is really just beginning.

In the meantime, I’m going to relax and enjoy my favorite things that I’ve mostly neglected in the hectic last eleven months of writing. Things like classical music, fiction, daytrips to the desert, Heidegger, not talking about hipsters, and being still.

And maybe I can also get to the task of opening my quaint elegant eatery. There will be cask ales, Spanish cheese, dark wood interior, and lots of pine nuts.

Heading Across the Pond

Brett McCracken — Sat, 23 May 2009 00:22:42 -0700

I’m leaving on Saturday on a “research”/“writing” trip to New York City, London, Oxford and Paris. The reason I’m going is threefold:

-I wanted to visit churches in New York City, London and Paris (probably the world’s three hippest cities) as part of my hipster church tour.
-I wanted to have a week in Oxford just to write.
-I needed new scenery and a summer vacation.

The coolest thing about my trip is that when I’m in Oxford, I will be staying at the Kilns—the quaint little English home of C.S. Lewis on the outskirts of the city. The house is owned by the C.S. Lewis Foundation, who I’ve been associated with for the last 4 years. The Foundation opens the home throughout the year to scholars and writers who need an inspiring place to get their work done. They call it the C.S. Lewis Study Centre.

Of course I feel completely lucky and spoiled that I’ll get to spend a week there—sleeping in the room where Lewis slept from 1930-1963. I’m immensely blessed to be able to write in the study where Lewis wrote the majority of his world-impacting texts. I only hope some of his brilliant, humble spirit will waft its way into my own hand as I write in that place. I don’t expect miracles—but Lewis would probably say that I should.

Anyway, I will be hopefully be updating my blog every few days throughout my time in Europe, wherever wifi is available. After my week in Oxford, I’ll be in London for a few days, and then in Paris for four days. So bon voyage, readers! Next time you hear from me will likely be Sunday night, from Brooklyn—where I’ll be writing from the cradle of hipster civilization.

"In" and "Out" is so 2009

Brett McCracken — Sun, 03 May 2009 22:33:07 -0700

I’ve been thinking a lot about trendiness of late (probably because I’m writing a book that deals largely with questions of cool, relevance, and trendiness in the context of Christianity). I’ve also been thinking about transience in general—impermanence, aging, death, things like that (probably because I just watched Synecdoche New York again). The two are related, of course. Nothing lasts in life—whether we’re talking about youth or our favorite TV show.

In my book I’m trying to locate “hip” in the context of metaphysics. How does the idea of being fashionable, cool, etc. correspond to our existence? We talk about it as a cultural construct all the time—and certainly this is important—but is it more elemental than that? Is the ephemeral in fashion and “cool” paralleled or derived from the ephemeral in our own very existence? In other words: is it a coincidence that 1) we all desire “cool,” 2) “cool” is necessarily an ever-changing, constantly cannibalizing phenomenon, and 3) we are all aware of death and the urgency of living?

Anyway, whether or not that makes complete sense or not, it got me thinking about the phrase “___ is the new ___.” It’s funny how fast something cool becomes old and is supplanted by something “new”… I mean, it’s like we acknowledge that we never really liked X all that much in the first place, now that we have Y. It’s like we are admitting that the reason we value something has nothing to do with its inherent qualities (our appreciation of which should theoretically withstand the winds of fashion) but everything to do with its cultural cache. But then again, perhaps we’re just being honest with ourselves: a scarf or musician or restaurant can never enchant us permanently, because as humans on this decaying planet we really only know how to deal in impermanence.

Anyway, that led me to think of some current examples of “___ is the new ___.”

Overplayed pop princesses: Lady Gaga is the new Rihanna

Healthy yuppie breakfast: Oatmeal is the new yogurt-and-granola

Confections: Macarons are the new cupcakes

High end icy desserts: Shave ice is the new Fro-yo

Hip hop beats: Exotic jungle bird sounds are the new 808s

Bearded hipster musicians: Dan Deacon is the new Sam Beam

Cable news-fueled paranoia: Swine flu is the new Recession

Sunglasses: John Lennons are the new Ray-Bans

NPR name dropping: Saying you hate waterboarding is the new saying you love Mad Men.

Hipster bars: Classy speakeasies are the new ironic biker dives

So what other examples can you think of?

Is Christianity Cool?

Brett McCracken — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 22:59:57 -0800

This is the title of chapter one of the book I am writing, and it’s the underlying question of the whole thing. I don’t expect to answer it definitively in the book, but it’s a question that begs to be explored, because it’s a question that is at least latently present in all the major movements and expressions of contemporary Christianity.

It’s a very complex question, to be sure. The book I am writing will treat it as such, and will not approach it in any sort of bifurcated, black-and-white manner. But that it is a complex question does not mean we should avoid talking about it and considering the very profound implications of the issues surrounding whatever answer we might give. Part of the problem in Christianity for the last several decades, I think, is that we’ve been unwilling to not only ask these questions but to wrestle seriously with them.

And so: Is Christianity Cool? In some ways it’s the leading question of our time, as evangelicals desperately try to keep their faith relevant in a rapidly changing culture. And most probably this question isn’t being explicitly asked, because to ask if something is cool automatically negates its coolness. Everyone who is or has ever been hip knows that coolness isn’t ever analyzed or spoken of in any way by those who possess it. Coolness is understood. It is mystery. It is contagious. And that last word is the key for many—especially those looking to sell something—seeking to tap into hip potential. Bridled cool is an economic cashcow. Translated to Christianity, cool is the currency whereby we must dispense the Gospel.

It is enormously interesting to me that we are so attracted and desirous of this thing called “cool,” but what is more intriguing to me is how exactly the search and adoption of coolness affects our lives. Is our longing to be fashionable, hip, stylish, and “ahead” of our peers benign? Or, if not, how does it affect our personhood (and, by extension, our Christianity) for good or ill?

The relative goodness or badness in the nature of “cool” is of utmost importance. Being stylish/trendy is certainly our society’s highest value, so the question we must ask as Christians is this: can we sustain integrity and substance in a world so driven by packaging? Must every work, every person, every message that seeks mass acceptance be form-fitted to the hieroglyphics of hip? Are the purposes and/or effects of cool compatible with those of Christianity? If we assume that “cool” necessarily connotes the notion of being elite, privileged, and somehow better than the masses, how can we reconcile the idea of “cool” with the idea of Christianity, which seems to beckon us away from self-aggrandizement of any and all kind?

Many will answer that making the church “cool” is simply a means to an end—a utilitarian approach to spreading the Gospel in a world where cool is the most efficient conduit of communication and transaction. If it is true that our culture today is most effectively reached through the channels of cool, does this mean Christianity’s message must be styled as such? What does this look like, and are there any alternatives? How does the Christian navigate in this climate without reducing the faith to an easy-to-swallow, hip-friendly phenomenon? Is the church’s future helped or hindered by an assimilation to cultural whims and fads?

We can all agree that the ultimate purpose of the church on earth is, as C.S. Lewis writes in Mere Christianity, “nothing else but to draw men into Christ.” But the challenging question is this: to what extent do we assume that men are drawn to Christ by the style in which He is presented to them? In other words, as the messengers of the gospel, are we to let the message speak for itself or must we jazz it up or package it in such a way that it is salient to the masses?

It is certainly appropriate that “packaging” is at the forefront of many church discussions today. In a world so obviously obsessed with style as a gateway to substance, we are right in viewing this as an important issue. But what are we losing when we start to sell Jesus as the ultimate in cool commodities?

Here’s another wrinkle: there are two very distinct categories of “hip” in today’s world: 1) The natural hip, and 2) The marketed hip. What I am speaking of above—about Christianity harnessing the horses of hip to help spread the message—is definitely the latter. When it’s about using cool to spread a message, it’s not naturally cool. Cool can never be authentic if it is a self-conscious activity (some might say, then, it is never authentic…).

But the majority of Christian hipsterdom is self-consciously so. This includes the churches that have candles everywhere and serve micro-brewed beer and cognac at potlucks to attract the rebellious young hipsters. These are the youth pastors who emphasize how God is all over things like The Sopranos, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and of course, U2. These are the Christians who like to speak of Jesus as a hippie countercultural activist who was a Che-esque revolutionary, and who probably would have smoked pot and listened to Radiohead were he on earth today. Essentially, this is a Christianity that bends over backward to be incredibly cool.

But in some instances, hip Christianity has been an organic phenomenon (that is, it hasn’t consciously striven to adopt some trend or characteristic of cool from the larger culture, but rather it has been a “first generation” cool that sets the trends of the larger culture and appears “cool” without really trying). Examples might be Daniel Smith (of the band Danielson Famile) or Sufjan Stevens—truly original artists who have embodied a certain strand of “indie/arthouse” style and subsequently launched many other talented, original Christian artists. I also think of people like Shane Claiborne, who—in efforts to live the humble life among the poor and downtrodden, Mother Theresa-style—has inadvertently framed Christianity in a “radical,” “progressive,” cool light.

Lest it sound like I am praising the Sufjans of the world and criticizing the, um, Toby Macs, let me just say: I’m not totally convinced that these “more authentic” Christian hipsters are substantively different than the inauthentic kind. At the end of the day, cool is cool—whether painstakingly strived for or halfway stumbled-upon.

And so there are many questions, many complexities. I haven’t got it all figured out. But I welcome your feedback.

I’m writing the book not to position myself as some sort of expert or to make some audacious claim about anything, but because I love Christianity and the church. I want to see her thrive, expand, and be all that she can be in the world. I want to see the cause of Christ advanced and nut muddled up. And this topic—the relationship of the church to the notion of “cool”—strikes me as a vitally important topic that needs to be addressed with tenderness, nuance, and–when appropriate–constructive rebuke. I hope to spark some necessary conversations, discourse, and soul-searching. And I don’t care if it’s all hopelessly uncool.

Interview with Brett McCracken

CJ Casciotta — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 10:31:51 -0800

Interview with Brett McCracken from CJ Casciotta on Vimeo.

CJ and Brett talk about Christian Hipsters, the Missional Movement, and Catch Phrases that should never be heard from again in 2009.