Abstract

In an age when Jon Stewart tops lists of most-trusted newscasters and Michael Moore becomes a focus of political campaign analysis, the satiric register has attained renewed and urgent prominence in political discourse. Day focuses on three central contemporary forms: the parodic news show, the satiric documentary, and ironic activism. She highlights their shared objective of circumventing the standard conduits of political information and the highly stage-managed nature of current political discourse. In so doing, she argues, they provide fans with a sense of community and purpose notably lacking from organized politics in the twenty-first century.