Review
This is a refreshingly intelligent and engaging book, offering a wide range of critical, sociological and theoretical approaches to recent trends in television comedy. Wraggs collection is at once very contemporary in its feel and aware of current comedys cultural heritage; so Seinfeld, is considered alongside I Love Lucy, M*A*S*H and Cheers. - Sight&Sound
Product Description
Because I Tell a Joke or Two explores the complex relationship between comedy and social difference. In provocative essays, the contributors consider issues of class, ethnicity, age, gender, and sexuality and reveal the ways comedy has been used to sustain, to challenge and to change power relationships in society. Spanning a wide range of genres, texts, and performers, from the Marx Brothers to Lea DeLaria, and from Ozzie and Harriet to Friends, Because I Tell a Joke or Two promises to make you think the next time you laugh along with a joke.
Contributors: Maggie Andrews, Frances Gray, Dave Huxley, C.P. Lee, Jane Littlewood, John McCallum, Mike Pickering, Laraine Porter, Mark Simpson, Stephen Small, Stephen Wagg, Paul Wells, and Frances Williams.
