Papers by Judith Y A R O S S Lee
University Press of Mississippi eBooks, Nov 12, 2012
Studies in American humor, 2011
Explorations in Media Ecology, Apr 1, 2003
Studies in American humor, Apr 1, 2015
Attacks on Sony Pictures Entertainment and Charlie Hebdo at the end of 2014 and the start of 2015... more Attacks on Sony Pictures Entertainment and Charlie Hebdo at the end of 2014 and the start of 2015 called the world's attention to the basic premise of this journal: comic arts matter as cultural products, and of all genres of comic art satire may matter most. But the important public topics of press freedom, attackers' motives, and responses to terrorism should not deflect humor scholars from urgent questions of our own: is satire funny? why should satire not prompt offense, even outrage? and why do visual media such as film, but especially cartoons, draw so much ire?
Explorations in Media Ecology, Apr 1, 2002
Americana E-Journal of American Studies in Hungary, 2023
Since the 1830s, mock-campaigns for President of the United States have featured comic candidates... more Since the 1830s, mock-campaigns for President of the United States have featured comic candidates descended from Brother Jonathan, the eighteenth-century folk figure who characterizes the ordinary American as the quintessential democratic citizen. Jonathan’s rustic innocence and virtue distinguish him from the corrupt politicians who arise from the elite, and thereby contribute to the two-faced joke—the Janus Laugh—underlying the past century’s many spoof campaigns: elitism in the form of populism. Via the reverse logic of irony and humor, nominations for unlikely spoof candidates endorse the status quo of seasoned politicians by implying that the alternative to elite leadership is a joke. Donald Trump’s 2016 candidacy demonstrates that the ideology of spoof campaigns also animates authentic runs for American political office.
Samuel L. Clemens lost the 1882 lawsuit declaring his exclusive right to use "Mark Twain&quo... more Samuel L. Clemens lost the 1882 lawsuit declaring his exclusive right to use "Mark Twain" as a commercial trademark, but he succeeded in the marketplace, where synergy among his comic journalism, live performances, authorship, and entrepreneurship made "Mark Twain" the premier national and international brand of American humor in his day. And so it remains in ours, because Mark Twain's humor not only expressed views of self and society well ahead of its time, but also anticipated ways in which humor and culture coalesce in today's postindustrial information economy--the global trade in media, performances, and other forms of intellectual property that began after the Civil War. In Twain's Brand: Humor in Contemporary American Culture, Judith Yaross Lee traces four hallmarks of Twain's humor that are especially significant today. Mark Twain's invention of a stage persona comically conflated with his biographical self lives on in contemporary performances by Garrison Keillor, Margaret Cho, Jerry Seinfeld, and Jon Stewart. The postcolonial critique of Britain that underlies America's nationalist tall tale tradition not only self-destructs in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court but also drives the critique of American Exceptionalism in Philip Roth's literary satires. The semi-literate writing that gives Adventures of Huckleberry Finn its "vernacular vision"--wrapping cultural critique in ostensibly innocent transgressions and misunderstandings--has a counterpart in the apparently untutored drawing style and social critique seen in The Simpsons, Lynda Barry's comics, and The Boondocks. And the humor business of recent decades depends on the same brand-name promotion, cross-media synergy, and copyright practices that Clemens pioneered and fought for a century ago. Twain's Brand highlights the modern relationship among humor, commerce, and culture that were first exploited by Mark Twain.
University Press of Mississippi eBooks, Nov 12, 2012
Studies in American humor, Apr 1, 2022
Studies in American humor, 2013
As the new editor of Studies in American Humor, I welcome readers to the next phase of the oldest... more As the new editor of Studies in American Humor, I welcome readers to the next phase of the oldest journal devoted to humor scholarship. I offer these remarks about the future of the journal and the field, and invite StAH readers to join me in reflecting on the theoretical, methodological, critical, and historical work needed for American humor studies to flourish today as a field that adds in significant ways to understanding American culture. Here I raise two concerns to start the discussion: theory and community. I feel keenly that our field needs new theoretical paradigms to guide our research and hope that the community of readers and contributors to this journal will rise to the challenge. “Enter Laughing: American Humor Studies in the Spirit of Our Times.” Studies in American Humor 3rd ser. 28 (2013): 1-15.
Explorations in Media Ecology, Apr 1, 2004
Studies in American Humor, 2021
Studies in American Humor, 2021
American Literary Realism, 2018
Samuel Clemens joked in one of his lectures that he had met “uncommonplace characters . . . Bunya... more Samuel Clemens joked in one of his lectures that he had met “uncommonplace characters . . . Bunyan, Martin Luther, Milton, and . . . others,”1 but it is not a stretch to say that he knew most famous Americans and many notable Europeans, Australians, and other international figures between the Civil War and World War I. In 1881, he asked President-elect james A. Garfield to renew a political appointment as the District of Columbia’s Recorder of Deeds for “a personal friend,” Frederick Douglass.2 In 1904, he mourned the death of African explorer henry Stanley, writing, “I have known no other friend & intimate so long, except john hay,” then Secretary of State.3 In the 1890s he not only discussed psychology with William james (and likely with Sigmund Freud as well) but also befriended the teen-aged helen Keller, noting with mock envy, “If I could have been deaf, dumb, and blind I also might have arrived at something.”4 As early as 1892, however, his social network had already grown so wide that eleven-year-old jean Clemens, impressed that her parents had received a dinner invitation from Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany following events with other dignitaries, remarked, “Why papa, if it keeps going on like this, pretty soon there won’t be anybody left for you to get acquainted with but God.”5 Yet sociable Sam Clemens was more than a famous man who knew other famous folks. The biographical, literary, and cultural significance of his personal and professional relationships drives a large scholarly literature.6 But his sociability deserves attention on its own, because from the start of his career, his writings grew from and through interactions with others. Take “Sociable jimmy,” a character sketch that Mark Twain drafted in a hotel room, fifty-three lectures into a five-month, seventy-six town tour in
The Mark Twain Annual, 2008
... Amy Kaplan holds that Twain crafted a nationalist American persona from international imperia... more ... Amy Kaplan holds that Twain crafted a nationalist American persona from international imperialist topics: she argues that his reporting trip to the Sandwich Islands (now Hawaii) for the Sacramento Union in 1866 launched a life of international travel through imperial centers and ...
Technology and Culture, 1984
American Periodicals: A Journal of History, Criticism, and Bibliography, 2005
Studies in American Humor, 2013
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Papers by Judith Y A R O S S Lee