Taylor Swift, Nostalgia Machine

Have you seen the viral video mashup of Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off" with a 1989 aerobics video? In the worlds of my sister "Stop whatever you are doing and watch this right now." The tempo has been sped up a bit to avoid copyright issues, but you can still see all its spandex glory.

These were my reactions when I first watched it:

• Of course Crystal Light sponsored a national aerobics championship
• This opening number resembles a beauty pageant opening; Miss America was still relevant then. 
• As kid in 1990, I would watch aerobics shows when I came home from kindergarten. They convinced me I needed those white cross-trainers or I would never be good at sports. 
• Those hi-cut leotards feel super dated, but so do the exercises. Any current fitness guide will tell you that relying on cardio arm flailing will not get you ripped - you have to lift too, bro. Our concept of health changes as often as our clothes. For example, I just heard a conference paper about how pale, thin tuberculosis patients exactly fit early 1800s standards of beauty.
• Taylor Swift really did capture the cadence of 80s pop music in her new album

I  have to admit, I listened to all of 1989 on a road trip with friends this weekend, and I really liked it. I also couldn't help over-analyzing the throwback theme she chose for it. The cds even come with Polaroid picture inserts! The name is her birth year, a time she literally cannot remember. Ironically, many of her fans weren't even alive then. They don't have Michael Jackson and Gloria Estefan lodged in their subconscious they way I do. 

Does this signal that the 80s have aged enough to move from big hair jokes to serious heritage? After all, the 1970s are no longer just a funny sitcom premise. Instead, wide lapel period dramas like Argo and American Hustle are Oscar nominees and X-Men prequels are set during the Nixon administration. To my siblings and me, this setting feels as exotic as the 1950s. Look at the people back then! Their clothes were so colorful and their music so lively! Now there's a generation coming into adulthood that feels the same way about the Reagan years. 

"Welcome to my house museum."

I'm both pleased and terrified that Swift might be an arbiter of how The Kids Today think about the past. Onthe one hand, she makes fun music and has a good eye for fashion and art direction. Her new video for "
Blank Space" is gorgeous, creepy, and packed with references to everything from Dorian Grey and Gone With the Wind to Mean Girls and Lady Gaga's "Paparazzi."

On the other hand, she's no historian. Her recent interview with Rolling Stone reveals how she cherry picks cute things from the past. For example, the living room of her TriBeCa penthouse displays a "fish tank filled with vintage baseballs ('I was like, 'That's so cool, they're so old!')  ... Against another wall, there's a rack full of white nightgowns. 'This is a thing me and Lena [Dunham] have,' says Swift ... 'We wear them during the day and look like pioneer women, fresh off the Oregon Trail.'"

Is this farb kidding me? Did she never even play the game Oregon Trail? Pioneer women wore petticoats and bonnets in the noonday sun, and white would be impractical for the rugged tasks of wagon travel, let alone attacks of dysentery. Somewhere Ma Ingalls is rolling in her grave.

Bigger things happened in 1989 than God's gift of Taylor to the world. The fall of the Berlin Wall and a presidential inauguration that year actually comprise some of my earliest political memories. Taylor Swift has shown herself to be capable of reflection, whether she's taking a break from the dating scene or re-examining what feminism means. I hope her new role as NYC ambassador will lead her to understand that the past isn't just a pretty backdrop for modern adventures, but a complex component of who we are today.