Second, as Kesia will discuss in more detail below, the show is extremely Ontario-centric.

I’m an 80s baby, but I distinctly remember the wood panelling in my parent’s home (still do not understand…) and I regularly ate sloppy joes (which I can’t stand). Nor would the home decor, or even the food, change quite so dramatically. So while the clothing worn by the children of the Campus family may have been somewhat reflective of reality, it is unlikely that a married couple with teenaged children would also have worn the same kinds of polyester leisure suits. The trends and fads of our youths tend to stay with us, and, as we age, we don’t necessarily keep up with the changing times. I still like the Spice Girls, though I understand that they are cool again. That’s why your grandparents’ house is probably stuck in the 1980s, and your mother still likes scrunchies. Time may move on, but people don’t necessarily do the same. This brings me to my first issue: the show is treating the decades and the people within them as discrete and separate categories. When I joked that I could not imagine my grandmother wearing bell bottoms, my mother replied that she wore tailored trousers, thank you very much. And lest you think my mother was merely unfashionable, you should know that she was a buyer for Holt Renfrew in the late 1970s, and decided what got sold in the children’s department. As she noted, people wore the same things then that they do now: jeans and t-shirts. She seriously objected to the clothing worn on the show, referring to it as stereotypical. There is a lot of evidence to suggest that young women in this era were often motivated to “not end up like their mothers.”īut my mother also made a couple of other interesting observations that tie in with my thoughts on this week’s episode. Women were not so one-dimensional, as we’ve discussed in previous episodes. My mother, who does not consider herself a feminist in any way shape or form, resented the way in which Tristan’s whole world seem to revolve around taking care of her family. I had to look this up, because I don’t speak 1970s, but Suzy Homemaker was a line of toys for girls to learn about what it was like to be a good housewife, including mini functional household appliances (blenders, washing machines, etc…). She seemed most offended by how women were portrayed, particularly the “Suzy Homemaker” style. As my mother explained, this was more like a stereotype of the 1970s than anything else, one that made them all look really stupid. And my dad (Gordon) apparently approved of the hockey segment. The first words out of her mouth were: “that was the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever seen.” She gave them credit for the phone, Kraft Dinner, the dishwasher, and the fondue.

Yes, I do realize I’m being a hypocrite by asking my mother after ranting about the difference between history and nostalgia. Since we’ve reached the 1970s, I thought it would be interesting to see what my mother, Susan Eidinger, thought of this episode, since she got married in 1976 (and no, I will not tell you how old she is, because I’d like to keep on living). Also, cheese is the best food ever, and I think we should officially rename the 1970s, ‘the Decade of Cheese.’ I wish we all had people who looked at us the way that Tristan looked at her new dishwasher. Regardless, I did enjoy this episode, and the Campus family was once again delightful. Welcome back to part three of our mini-series reviewing CBC’s new show, Back in Time for Dinner!Īs Kesia notes below, I’m not sure if the episodes are getting better, or I’m enjoying them more due to increasing or decreasing familiarity.

Back in time for dinner