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th culture and production. In this chapter I shall illustrate this impact using the theoretical frameworks discussed earlier along with my own interpretations of the concepts that they provide. 5.2. Baudrillard and the bygone object. For Baudrillard the bygone object, which is the catalyst of nostalgia, has one function only - that of a signifier. Indeed he states that, "...the bygone object is purely mythological in its reference to the past. It no longer has any practical importance, but exists solely in order to signify" (Baudrillard 1990:35). What the bygone object signifies is the essence of time, not real time but the cultural indices of time. This is why, according to Baudrillard, the bygone object always looks out of place. In other words the bygone object "...presents itself as authentic in a system whose rationale is not at all authenticity, but the calculated relations and abstraction of the sign" (Baudrillard 1990:36). What I believe Baudrillard is describing here is a simulation, it is a simulation of a bygone era. What seems to be central to this idea is that we create mental images which relate to an object and simulate the period that the object relates to. For example in my house I have a Victorian style fireplace3 which is a symbol representing a section of the Victorian era. Now, the fireplace allows us to conjure a mental image of what the Victorian era was like. However, this image cannot be whole or real or even accurate because we did not exist at that time. What we do is to take snippets of Victoriana and create our version of the Victorian era which stands in relation to us and to the earlier period. We simulate the Victorian era and can live what we believe the Victorian era to be. 5.3. Baudrillard and the purpose of nostalgia. Why is it then that we are motivated to surround ourselves with objects that make us feel nostalgic? Baudrillard (1990:36-37) argues that the need they fulfil is, "...that of a definitive being, a bygone object is always, in the full sense of the term, a 'family portrait'. It immemorialises a prior being in the form of a concrete object - a process equivalent....to the elision of time". This, according to Baudrillard (1990:37), is what functional objects lack, since, "....if they [functional objects ] fix the environment more or less securely in space, they do not fix it in time.....The functional object is effectual, while the mythological object is complete....it [the mythological object] signifies birth". So, the bygone is not merely a snapshot of a time it is that time and space encapsulated and preserved - it is a conjuncture, a piece of history. The functional object can fix an environment in space but not in time because the time that they exist in is being experienced at that precise moment. Further to this it follows that because of the continuous nature of time a contemporary object cannot fix an environment in time because that time may not have arrived yet even if it is only a split second away. An environment, and therefore an object within that environment, must have existed and elapsed in order for the object to be able to fix it in time. Now, this argument is useful in that it explains how the bygone object acts as a signifier of a certain era, a person's particular taste or dis-satisfaction with their current conjuncture. However it does not explain why there is a plethora of museums, trends in fashion, music, and decor which rely upon nostalgia. The only way in