Critical Currents in Contemporary Graphic Design

both essays argue in favour of a modernism which is slightly uncomfortable, that is one which pushes boundaries because it is actively responding to the conditions of its time. 

good history/bad history calls to account design which copies or echoes 'modern' graphic design, rather than being modern (embracing modernist principles). the authors argue that this is designing out of context because it assumes that what made sense in one period can be applied uncritically to another. they add that this comes from having a canon of graphic design which is largely composed of elite aesthetic rather than the true everyday design which was made by an unnamed designer and is not part of the canon. jive modernism is the uncritical borrowing of a successful past form.

i was really confused by this but after thinking it over...

the difference between their two viewpoints on modernism is that metahaven has a faith (informed by the context of their work [life]) in the difference allowed by the sameness of modernism and modernist platforms, and further that this is communitarian.

experimental jetset agrees but with the caveat that modernist language (rather than style, actually this was a correction offered by metahaven but i think it's appropriate) is egalitarian in print, in an environment beyond the web which is too tailored to the individuals preferences in what to view.

From Wiki:

"Cooper Black is a heavily weighted, old style serif typeface designed byOswald Bruce Cooper in 1921 and released by the Barnhart Brothers & Spindler type foundry in 1922. The typeface is drawn as an extra bold weight ofCooper Old Style. Though not based on a single historic model, Cooper Black exhibits influences of Art Nouveau, Art Deco, and the Machine Age. Cooper Black was a predominant lettering style popularized by Oswald Bruce Cooper in Chicago and the Midwest of America in the 1920s, given typographic form. An earlier weight of Cooper's type designs, Cooper Old Style (later just "Cooper") was released first, though Cooper Black was what BB&S foundry was after. Cooper Black was advertised as being "for far-sighted printers with near-sighted customers", as well as "the Black Menace" by detractors."

I have such strong feelings about this typeface which actually softened when I read that description. I associate it with 'cheap' graphic design, like hiring someone who isn't a designer or just choosing yourself from desktop fonts because you've seen it before... In one of my courses this term we talked about this typeface, it came up, and everyone responded so harshly it's funny.