![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() "Noted television and pop culture academic and critic Lavery-who haspreviously written and edited scholarly texts on such television supernovasas Twin Peaks, The X-Files, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer-has whipped up afrothy egg cream of an essay collection on Seinfeld for eggheads. This means we can admire their insights without giving up our love for the best television farce we'll ever see. The platoon of scholars writing the essays understand Seinfeld as brilliant popular art, not merely a specimen demanding intellectual dissection. Appreciation and enjoyment, combined with wonder at the cleverness of the program's writers, set the tone. Hibbs in 2000.But this latest book notably differs in tone from standard university products. This isn't the first attempt to provide fodder for Seinfeld studies - earlier works include William Irwin's 1999 collection, Seinfeld and Philosophy: A Book about Everything and Nothing, and Shows About Nothing: Nihilism in Popular Culture from The Exorcist to Seinfeld, written by Thomas S. While not for a moment suggesting that Jerry and George be compared to cowboys on Brokeback Mountain, she nevertheless deftly makes the point that as TV characters they are the perfect married couple.Her essay appears in Seinfeld, Master of Its Domain: Revisiting Television's Greatest Sitcom (Continuum), edited by David Lavery and Sara Lewis Dunne of Middle Tennessee State University. With their lives and their world now sealed off in a 20th-century time capsule, they have become appropriate subjects for cheeky theorizing in the universities.Di Mattia's essay, for instance, explores a fascinating question with persuasive force. We expect to be rewarded, at best, with the warm feeling of virtue that follows the performance of a duty requiring heavy lifting.But it turns out that Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer, whose program ceased production in 1998 but still circles the planet in endless reruns, provide as much fun for academics as for the rest of us. Di Mattia's essay, "Male Anxiety and the Buddy System in Seinfeld," does nothing to lighten our mood. Readers familiar with academic "cultural studies" aren't likely to tingle with anticipation when our eyes fall on a scholarly article from the Centre for Women's Studies and Gender Research at Monash University in Melbourne. "Get Out!": Back Pages Betty Lee, Seinfeld Lexicon Seinfeld Episode and Situation Guide (by David Lavery) Seinfeld Intertexts and Allusions Contributors Bibliography Index Afterword David Lavery, Middle Tennessee State University, with Marc Leverette, Colorado State University, Re-Reading Seinfeld after Curb Your Enthusiasm Section 6. Reeves (Texas Tech University), From Must-See-TV to Branded Counter Programming: Seinfeld and Syndication Section 5. Epstein (Southwestern University School of Law), Mark C. Peterman on Seinfeld Elke van Cassel (Radboud University Nijmegen), Getting the Joke: Seinfeld from a European Perspective Michael M. "It is so sad, all your knowledge of high culture comes from Bugs Bunny cartoons": Cultural, Pop Cultural, and Media Matters Geoffrey O'Brien, The Republic of Seinfeld Sara Lewis Dunne (Middle Tennessee State University), Seinfood: Purity, Danger, and Food Codes on Seinfeld Eleanor Hersey (Fresno Pacific University), "It'll Always Be Burma to Me": J. Di Mattia (Monash University), Male Anxiety and the Buddy System in Seinfeld Matthew Bond, "Are they having babies just so people will visit them?": Parents and Children on Seinfeld Jon Stratton (Curtin University of Technology), Seinfeld is a Jewish Sitcom, Isn't It: Ethnicity and Assimilation on 1990s American Television Section 4. "If I like their race, how can that be racist?": Gender, Generations, and Ethnicity Joanna L. "Maybe the dingoes ate your baby": Genre, Humor, Intertextuality Michael Dunne (Middle Tennessee State University), Seinfeld as Intertextual Comedy Barbara Ching (University of Memphis), They Laughed Unhappily Ever After: Seinfeld, Situation Comedy, and the Encounter with Nothingness Dennis Hall (University of Louisville), Jane Austen, Meet Jerry Seinfeld Amy McWilliams (Texas A & M), Genre Expectation and Narrative Innovation in Seinfeld Section 3. "Giddy-Up!": Introductions Albert Auster (Fordham University), Much Ado About Nothing: Some Final Thoughts on Seinfeld David Marc (Syracuse University), Seinfeld: A Show (Almost) About Nothing Bill Wyman, Seinfeld Reflections on Seinfeld Section 2. "Part of Popular Culture": The Legacy of Seinfeld Section 1. David Lavery and Sara Lewis Dunne (Middle Tennessee State University), Preface. ![]()
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