A Comedian and an Activist Walk into a Bar

A Comedian and an Activist Walk into a Bar PDF Author: Caty Borum Chattoo
Publisher: University of California Press
ISBN: 0520299760
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
Comedy is a powerful contemporary source of influence and information. In the still-evolving digital era, the opportunity to consume and share comedy has never been as available. And yet, despite its vast cultural imprint, comedy is a little-understood vehicle for serious public engagement in urgent social justice issues – even though humor offers frames of hope and optimism that can encourage participation in social problems. Moreover, in the midst of a merger of entertainment and news in the contemporary information ecology, and a decline in perceptions of trust in government and traditional media institutions, comedy may be a unique force for change in pressing social justice challenges. Comedians who say something serious about the world while they make us laugh are capable of mobilizing the masses, focusing a critical lens on injustices, and injecting hope and optimism into seemingly hopeless problems. By combining communication and social justice frameworks with contemporary comedy examples, authors Caty Borum Chattoo and Lauren Feldman show us how comedy can help to serve as a vehicle of change. Through rich case studies, audience research, and interviews with comedians and social justice leaders and strategists, A Comedian and an Activist Walk Into a Bar: The Serious Role of Comedy in Social Justice explains how comedy – both in the entertainment marketplace and as cultural strategy – can engage audiences with issues such as global poverty, climate change, immigration, and sexual assault, and how activists work with comedy to reach and empower publics in the networked, participatory digital media age.

A Comedian and an Activist Walk into a Bar

A Comedian and an Activist Walk into a Bar PDF Author: Caty Borum Chattoo
Publisher: University of California Press
ISBN: 0520299760
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 295

Get Book

Book Description
Comedy is a powerful contemporary source of influence and information. In the still-evolving digital era, the opportunity to consume and share comedy has never been as available. And yet, despite its vast cultural imprint, comedy is a little-understood vehicle for serious public engagement in urgent social justice issues – even though humor offers frames of hope and optimism that can encourage participation in social problems. Moreover, in the midst of a merger of entertainment and news in the contemporary information ecology, and a decline in perceptions of trust in government and traditional media institutions, comedy may be a unique force for change in pressing social justice challenges. Comedians who say something serious about the world while they make us laugh are capable of mobilizing the masses, focusing a critical lens on injustices, and injecting hope and optimism into seemingly hopeless problems. By combining communication and social justice frameworks with contemporary comedy examples, authors Caty Borum Chattoo and Lauren Feldman show us how comedy can help to serve as a vehicle of change. Through rich case studies, audience research, and interviews with comedians and social justice leaders and strategists, A Comedian and an Activist Walk Into a Bar: The Serious Role of Comedy in Social Justice explains how comedy – both in the entertainment marketplace and as cultural strategy – can engage audiences with issues such as global poverty, climate change, immigration, and sexual assault, and how activists work with comedy to reach and empower publics in the networked, participatory digital media age.

Story Movements

Story Movements PDF Author: Caty Borum Chattoo
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190943440
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
Only a few years after the 2013 Sundance Film Festival premiere of Blackfish - an independent documentary film that critiqued the treatment of orcas in captivity - visits to SeaWorld declined, major corporate sponsors pulled their support, and performing acts canceled appearances. The steady drumbeat of public criticism, negative media coverage, and unrelenting activism became known as the "Blackfish Effect." In 2016, SeaWorld announced a stunning corporate policy change - the end of its profitable orca shows. In an evolving networked era, social-issue documentaries like Blackfish are art for civic imagination and social critique. Today's documentaries interrogate topics like sexual assault in the U.S. military (The Invisible War), racial injustice (13th), government surveillance (Citizenfour), and more. Artistic nonfiction films are changing public conversations, influencing media agendas, mobilizing communities, and capturing the attention of policymakers - accessed by expanding audiences in a transforming media marketplace. In Story Movements: How Documentaries Empower People and Inspire Social Change, producer and scholar Caty Borum Chattoo explores how documentaries disrupt dominant cultural narratives through complex, creative, often investigative storytelling. Featuring original interviews with award-winning documentary filmmakers and field leaders, the book reveals the influence and motivations behind the vibrant, eye-opening stories of the contemporary documentary age.

A Comedian and an Activist Walk into a Bar

A Comedian and an Activist Walk into a Bar PDF Author: Caty Borum Chattoo
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520971353
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
"A comprehensive and insightful examination of the ways comedy can help shape social justice movements."––Hasan Minhaj, Comedian and Host of the Netflix series Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj Comedy is a powerful contemporary source of influence and information. In the still-evolving digital era, the opportunity to consume and share comedy has never been as available. And yet, despite its vast cultural imprint, comedy is a little-understood vehicle for serious public engagement in urgent social justice issues – even though humor offers frames of hope and optimism that can encourage participation in social problems. Moreover, in the midst of a merger of entertainment and news in the contemporary information ecology, and a decline in perceptions of trust in government and traditional media institutions, comedy may be a unique force for change in pressing social justice challenges. Comedians who say something serious about the world while they make us laugh are capable of mobilizing the masses, focusing a critical lens on injustices, and injecting hope and optimism into seemingly hopeless problems. By combining communication and social justice frameworks with contemporary comedy examples, authors Caty Borum Chattoo and Lauren Feldman show us how comedy can help to serve as a vehicle of change. Through rich case studies, audience research, and interviews with comedians and social justice leaders and strategists, A Comedian and an Activist Walk Into a Bar: The Serious Role of Comedy in Social Justice explains how comedy – both in the entertainment marketplace and as cultural strategy – can engage audiences with issues such as global poverty, climate change, immigration, and sexual assault, and how activists work with comedy to reach and empower publics in the networked, participatory digital media age.

The Revolution Will Be Hilarious

The Revolution Will Be Hilarious PDF Author: Caty Borum
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 1479810827
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
"The Revolution Will Be Hilarious: Comedy for Social Change and Civic Power reveals how and why comedy fuels contemporary social change, how post-millennial activists collaborate with comedians and the evolving entertainment industry, and why creativity and cultural power matter for social justice. Through research and an insider journey into transforming entertainment industry and activism practices, the book explains why deviant creativity expressed through comedy builds civic power-and can help change the world"--

Comedy and the Politics of Representation

Comedy and the Politics of Representation PDF Author: Helen Davies
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319905066
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Book Description
This edited collection explores the representations of identity in comedy and interrogates the ways in which “humorous” constructions of gender, sexuality, ethnicity, religion, class and disability raise serious issues about privilege, agency and oppression in popular culture. Should there be limits to free speech when humour is aimed at marginalised social groups? What are the limits of free speech when comedy pokes fun at those who hold social power? Can taboo joking be used towards politically progressive ends? Can stereotypes be mocked through their re-invocation? Comedy and the Politics of Representation: Mocking the Weak breaks new theoretical ground by demonstrating how the way people are represented mediates the triadic relationship set up in comedy between teller, audience and butt of the joke. By bringing together a selection of essays from international scholars, this study unpacks and examines the dynamic role that humour plays in making and remaking identity and power relations in culture and society.

We Had a Little Real Estate Problem

We Had a Little Real Estate Problem PDF Author: Kliph Nesteroff
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1982103051
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
"From renowned comedy journalist and historian Kliph Nesteroff comes the underappreciated story of Native Americans and comedy"--

Ella Baker's Catalytic Leadership

Ella Baker's Catalytic Leadership PDF Author: Patricia S. Parker
Publisher: University of California Press
ISBN: 0520300912
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 198

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Book Description
Ella Baker (1903–1986) was an influential African American civil rights and human rights activist. For five decades, she worked behind the scenes with people in vulnerable communities to catalyze social justice leadership. Her steadfast belief in the power of ordinary people to create change continues to inspire social justice activists around the world. This book describes a case study that translates Ella Baker’s community engagement philosophy into a catalytic leadership praxis, which others can adapt for their work. Catalytic leadership is a concrete set of communication practices for social justice leadership produced in equitable partnership with, instead of on, communities. The case centers the voices of African American teenage girls who were living in a segregated neighborhood of an affluent college town and became part of a small collective of college students, parents, university faculty, and community activists learning leadership in the spirit of Ella Baker.

Bad Environmentalism

Bad Environmentalism PDF Author: Nicole Seymour
Publisher: U of Minnesota Press
ISBN: 1452958092
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 301

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Book Description
Traces a tradition of ironic and irreverent environmentalism, asking us to rethink the movement’s reputation for gloom and doom Activists today strive to educate the public about climate change, but sociologists have found that the more we know about alarming issues, the less likely we are to act. Meanwhile, environmentalists have acquired a reputation as gloom-and-doom killjoys. Bad Environmentalism identifies contemporary texts that respond to these absurdities and ironies through absurdity and irony—as well as camp, frivolity, irreverence, perversity, and playfulness. Nicole Seymour develops the concept of “bad environmentalism”: cultural thought that employs dissident affects and sensibilities to reflect critically on our current moment and on mainstream environmental activism. From the television show Wildboyz to the short film series Green Porno, Seymour shows that this tradition of thought is widespread—spanning animation, documentary, fiction film, performance art, poetry, prose fiction, social media, and stand-up comedy since at least 1975. Seymour argues that these texts reject self-righteousness and sentimentality, undercutting public negativity toward activism and questioning basic environmentalist assumptions: that love and reverence are required for ethical relationships with the nonhuman and that knowledge is key to addressing problems like climate change. Funny and original, Bad Environmentalism champions the practice of alternative green politics. From drag performance to Indigenous comedy, Seymour expands our understanding of how environmental art and activism can be pleasurable, even in a time of undeniable crisis.

This Crazy Time

This Crazy Time PDF Author: Tzeporah Berman
Publisher: Knopf Canada
ISBN: 030739980X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 386

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Book Description
From one of the world's most controversial campaigners, This Crazy Time is the No Logo of the NEW environmental movement, an essential must-read that combines Bill Bryson's personable style and humour with Naomi Klein's hard-hitting activism and research. Passionate, profound, inspiring and funny, Berman is inspiring people from all walks of life to get off the sidelines and fight the good fight--and win. This unique book--part manifesto from a leader, part humorous activist memoir from a soccer mom--offers a wryly honest, behind the scenes, ultimately uplifting look at the state of the planet. For almost 20 years, Tzeporah Berman has been one of our most influential environmentalists. A founder of ForestEthics and PowerUp Canada, she was instrumental in shaping the tactics and concerns of the modern environmental movement. In her early 20s she faced nearly one thousand criminal charges and 6 years in prison for her role organizing blockades in Canada's rainforest. With ForestEthics she took on Victoria's Secret with a photo of a chainsaw-wielding lingerie model, convincing the catalogue manufacturer to stop using paper made from old-growth forests. She then transformed her tactics and sat down with CEOs and political leaders to reshape their policies and practices. She participated in saving over 12 million acres of endangered forests, including Canada's Great Bear Rainforest, and has campaigned against the development of Canada's oil sands. In her new role at Greenpeace International she is fighting the problem of our time: climate change, including researching the impacts of the Gulf Oil Spill and protesting oil drilling in the Arctic. As a concerned mother, her book is an impassioned plea for a better world.

The Filthy Truth

The Filthy Truth PDF Author: Andrew Dice Clay
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1476734755
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
From Andrew Dice Clay, the “Undisputed Heavyweight Comedy King,” comes the unapologetic and uncensored autobiography fans have been waiting for. Andrew Dice Clay’s raw and uncensored stand-up comedy has shocked and entertained audiences for decades and continues to do so to this day. When he released his debut album, Dice, in 1989, the parental advisory label simply read “Warning: This album is offensive.” His material stretched the boundaries of decency and good taste to their breaking point, and in turn he became the biggest stand-up comic in the world. But Dice’s meteoric rise and spectacular fame brought on a furious backlash from the media and critics. By the mid-nineties, though still playing to packed audiences, the turmoil in his personal life, plus attacks from every activist group imaginable, led him to make the decision to step out of the spotlight and put the focus on raising his boys. The Diceman was knocked down, but not out. Taking inspiration from what Frank Sinatra once told him—“You work for your fans, not the media. The media gets their tickets for free”—Dice has bounced back with critically acclaimed roles and is once again playing to sold-out audiences. Filled with no-holds-barred humor and honesty, The Filthy Truth sets the record straight and gives fans plenty of never-before-shared stories from his career and his friendships with Howard Stern, Sam Kinison, Mickey Rourke, Sylvester Stallone, Axl Rose, and countless others.