DIY

The basic appeal of creating these home-made ‘magazines’ is easy to see – the opportunity to write whatever you want and tap into a willing audience, with no restrictions.

He enjoys the drifting life, travelling across America in search of plates to wash.

freedom of spontaneous quitting.

He doesn’t want the responsibility of a job he feels tied to and is happy to travel across the country working temporarily in each town.

Greenberger sought to communicate with people different from himself, believing that it was important to try and overcome the generation gap that may exist between young people and the elderly. In a culture where youth is so highly valued, and the ageing process so greatly feared, he uses the zine medium to explore the reality that people do not really change

He wasn’t interested in compiling an oral history project, which concentrated on the memories of the residents’ past while ignoring their present. Instead, he wanted to capture an essence of who they were.

Zines celebrate the idea that you can print anything and at least one other person will want to read it.

‘They [zine writers] celebrate the everyperson in a world of celebrity, losers in a society that rewards the best and brightest.’

But the zine appears to be the perfect participatory cultural experience

Unlike the message of mass media, which is to encourage people to consume, the zine encourages people to take part and produce something for themselves.