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Interviews with scholars of popular culture about their new books.
As Muslim American representation becomes more prominent in popular culture, how are they continued to be portrayed? Rosemary Pennington's new book …
Jewish stars have longed faced pressure to downplay Jewish identity for fear of alienating wider audiences. But unexpectedly, since the 2000s, many mi…
It’s the UConn Popcast, and Purple Rain, Prince’s semi-autobiographical, semi-concert film, hit cinemas 40 years ago this week. The movie followed the…
Love Me Fierce In Danger: The Life of James Ellroy (Bloomsbury, 2023) is the story of James Ellroy, one of the most provocative and singular figures i…
In his new book, We're Not Here to Entertain: Punk Rock, Ronald Reagan, and the Real Culture War of 1980s America (Oxford UP, 2020), Kevin Mattson doc…
Burn It Down: Feminist Manifestos for the Revolution (Verso, 2020), Breanne Fahs has curated a comprehensive collection of feminist manifestos from th…
Videogames have always depicted representations of American culture, but how exactly they feed back into this culture is less obvious. Advocating an a…
"A woman in trouble" In her monograph Inland Empire (Fireflies Press, 2021), film critic Melissa Anderson explores meaning (or the impossibility ther…
Soul is one of those concepts that is often evoked, but rarely satisfactorily defined. In The Meaning of Soul: Black Music and Resilience Since the 19…
Before 2010, there were no Israeli horror films. Then distinctly Israeli serial killers, zombies, vampires, and ghosts invaded local screens. The next…
I Spit On Your Celluloid: The History of Women Directing Horror Movies (Headpress, 2024) by Heidi Honeycutt is the first book-length history of female…
In Dance Music Spaces: Clubs, Clubbers, and DJs Navigating Authenticity, Branding, and Commercialism (Lexington Books, 2022), Danielle Antoinette Hida…
The mainstream news media struggles to understand the power of social media. In contrast, conspiracy advocates, malicious political movements, and eve…
What if the original teachings of Jesus were different from the Bible's sanitized 'orthodox' version? What covert motivations might inspire those who …
In 1900, Britain and America were in the grip of a cat craze. An animal that had for centuries been seen as a household servant or urban nuisance had …
Las Vegas is a place the American dream made; a city built in the middle of desert visited by millions of people every year hoping to make their dream…
In the 1990s, India's mediascape saw the efflorescence of edgy soft-porn films in the Malayalam-speaking state of Kerala. In Rated A: Soft-Porn Cinema…
In 1971, the New York Times called the Taiwanese-Chinese chef, Fu Pei-Mei, the “the Julia Child of Chinese cooking.” But, as Michelle T. King notes …
In September 2006, Margo Jefferson spoke to the Institute about her book, On Michael Jackson (Vintage, 2007). Jefferson received the 1995 Pulitzer Pri…
Casablanca is one of the most celebrated Hollywood films of all time, its iconic romance enshrined in collective memory across generations. Drawing fr…