Blame Canada!:

Blame Canada!: "South Park" and Contemporary Culture

by ToniJohnson-Woods (Author)

Synopsis

Now running into its tenth season, South Park has still not jumped the shark . Satirically edgier than The Simpsons , South Park responds immediately to cultural controversies: four days after Saddam Hussein's capture, an episode lampooned it, and the show has no fear in tackling subjects as divisive and outlandish as Terry Schiavo, The Passion of the Christ , Tom Cruise's alleged homosexuality, and Michael Jackson. Its mixture of iconoclasm, cultural referents, and intertextuality makes it the perfect lens through which to examine contemporary popular culture in America - and television's role in the creation of that culture. Blame Canada! is a smart, readable book that will appeal to the show's many fans, placing the show in a tradition of fearless and often foul-mouthed satire dating back as far as Rabelais.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 271
Edition: illustrated edition
Publisher: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd.
Published: 31 May 2007

ISBN 10: 0826417310
ISBN 13: 9780826417312

Media Reviews
Mentioned.--, New Statesman
Mentioned.--Eric Griffiths New Statesman
South Park's biggest badge of honour is that, ten seasons in, it remains lightning fast in its response to current events (four days for Saddam Hussein's capture). This book of essays shows it to be a surprisingly significant lens on US culture. Empire
Mentioned.--Sanford Lakoff New Statesman
Author Bio
Toni Johnson-Woods is a lecturer in Contemporary Studies at the University of Queensland. To date she has published three books on popular culture: the first was an academic treatise on popular 19th century fiction; the second book, Big Bother (University of Queensland Press, 2002), was the first book to examine Reality TV and combine academic evaluation with fandom; and the third book Gone but not Forgotten (National Library of Australia, 2004) examines pulp fiction.