Hymans:The Changing Color of Money Not only the EU,but also nation-states eager to retain their own relevance are faced with the difficulty of adjusting their discourse to the new, postmodern era (Soysal,1994;van Ham,2001).This is more difficult than previous values transitions because postmodernism attacks the very concept of a hegemonic discourse.Part and parcel with the fuzziness of the notion of postmodern identity content,it is hard to identify the broad iconographic choices most congruent with it.But clearly some iconographic choices are quickly becoming old fashioned,with the practice of celebrating the 'Great Men and Masterpieces'of culture at the top of that list.Moreover,the recent twist of replacing the 'Great Men'with 'Great Women'seems little more than a temporary measure.For the new era is calling into question the whole notion of ranking artists and cultural emanations as high'or 'low' (Peterson and Kern,1996).Thus authors of children's literature have come to seem as worthy of our respect as the masters of the sonnet.One could therefore imagine a banknote series devoted to 'lowbrow'cultural heroes and heroines.But even to celebrate such people would be somewhat antithetical to the new ethos,since to single out anyone for special praise means not selecting others.So,a postmodern currency iconography,while maintaining as ever before the goal of producing legitimacy for the state project,might well abandon the 'celebratory'banknote altogether.More- over,it might even go further and abandon the past practice of transmitting any literal,unmistakable message.For the postmodern rejects cultural 'author/ity'in favor of a radical democratic vision of author and reader jointly producing the meaning of 'text'.A currency fully in tune with postmodern cultural norms would therefore offer something rather abstract and open to multiple interpretations,enticing the citizen-consumer to identify with and,indeed,to form his or her own vision of community. Karen Cerulo has found this trend toward abstraction in her study of national flags and anthems (Cerulo,1995:163). There is one clear example of such a postmodern currency iconography- the recent banknotes of the Netherlands(see the Appendix for illustrations). Until the 1920s,Dutch Gulden (Guilder)offered the typical diet of Mercury,Minerva and women swathed in flowing robes.In the 1920s,these classical images began to cede their place to political and social figures such as William of Orange,Queen Emma,a Zeeland farmer's wife and Rembrandt's portraits of burghers.In the 1950s,cultural figures came into vogue,and notes now pictured Rembrandt himself,Erasmus,Grotius and others.But then,in the late 1970s,rather than simply 'updating'these images by introducing popular or female cultural figures as other European currencies did,the Dutch made a radical choice-they issued a series of notes with natural,not human figures.The 50 Gulden note featured sunflowers(not the national flower,which is the tulip);the 100 Gulden note 21 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner.Further reproduction prohibited without permission.Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission