The Suspension of Time: Viscosity and the Semiotic Fantasy of Eternal Youth

Asbjorg Dunker

The presentation explores how contemporary beauty culture transforms the ancient desire for eternal youth into a viscous semiotic system, one in which time appears slowed, thickened, or suspended. Audience members will learn how the shift from “fighting aging” to “maintaining youthfulness” creates a cultural illusion of temporal control. The talk reveals how advertising rhetoric, self-care ideology, and consumer rituals collaborate to produce a symbolic experience of extended presentness. Participants will understand why the myth of agelessness persists even when its promises remain unfulfilled: it is sticky, affective, and continually renewed through daily routines. The takeaway is a deeper understanding of how viscosity helps explain cultural fantasies that are neither fully believed nor entirely abandoned.