Metamodern Satire in Contemporary American Literature and Television

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dc.contributor.advisorHogue, W. Lawrence
dc.contributor.committeeMemberEhlers, Sarah
dc.contributor.committeeMemberGonzalez, Maria C.
dc.contributor.committeeMemberCaron, James E.
dc.creatorChesters, Samantha A.
dc.creator.orcid0000-0002-7683-1340
dc.date.accessioned2020-06-02T03:14:08Z
dc.date.createdMay 2020
dc.date.issued2020-05
dc.date.submittedMay 2020
dc.date.updated2020-06-02T03:14:08Z
dc.description.abstractIn 2002, Linda Hutcheon argued that the postmodern moment has passed, and what developed in its wake must be given a distinct term of its own. Answering this call, Timotheus Vermeulen and Robin van den Akker posited metamodernism, a movement that, at its heart, is the negotiation between the conflicting objectives of postmodernism and resurgent modernism. Applying this process to the genre of satire, this project proposes a hybrid mode—metamodern satire—that mediates between the equally divergent objectives of its modern and postmodern predecessors. Modernist satire targeted human folly and vice with the objective of societal correction. As postmodernism emerged, the purpose of satire evolved, as its postmodern form replaced correction with destabilization of metanarratives. In this project, I argue that as elements of modernism have resurfaced in the metamodern era, a new theory of satire must be developed to account for satires existing in the liminal space between modernism and postmodernism. To exemplify this mode, this study includes literature from the 2000s, Percival Everett’s Erasure and George Saunders’s “Brad Carrigan, American,” as well as television programs from the 2010s, Shalom Auslander’s Happyish and Nick Kroll and Andrew Goldberg’s Big Mouth. Collectively, the texts illustrate the way metamodern satire is uniquely suited to negotiate between overlapping calls for postmodern irony and modernist sincerity. I deconstruct the way these satires must first destabilize a social metanarrative, such as neoliberalism or white supremacy, often through the subversion of a symbolic metanarrative, such as advertising or puberty. While this process is often characterized by irony and irreverence, each text eventually sheds these elements to provide a genuinely tendered solution—a return to modernist correction. I argue that the resulting form is one in which destabilization and correction take place in sequence, providing a fertile foundation for the emergence of a new, attendant mode of humor, simultaneously characterized by irreverent cynicism and sincere optimism.
dc.description.departmentEnglish, Department of
dc.format.digitalOriginborn digital
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdf
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10657/6567
dc.language.isoeng
dc.rightsThe author of this work is the copyright owner. UH Libraries and the Texas Digital Library have their permission to store and provide access to this work. Further transmission, reproduction, or presentation of this work is prohibited except with permission of the author(s).
dc.subjectsatire
dc.subjectmetamodernism
dc.subjectpostmodernism
dc.subjectNew Sincerity
dc.subjectAmerican literature
dc.subjecttelevision
dc.subjecthumor studies
dc.titleMetamodern Satire in Contemporary American Literature and Television
dc.type.dcmiText
dc.type.genreThesis
local.embargo.lift2022-05-01
local.embargo.terms2022-05-01
thesis.degree.collegeCollege of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
thesis.degree.departmentEnglish, Department of
thesis.degree.disciplineEnglish
thesis.degree.grantorUniversity of Houston
thesis.degree.levelDoctoral
thesis.degree.nameDoctor of Philosophy

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