In celebration of The Simpsons reaching 450 episodes, KCBS had a feature on the show this morning, where I was invited to speak along with Paul Cantor, Professor of English at University of Virginia. By the way — be sure to check out this Sunday’s The Simpsons 20th Anniversary Special: In 3-D! On Ice hosted by Morgan Spurlock (of Super Size Me fame). While you’re waiting for Sunday, you might also enjoy this article or this blog post on the upcoming event.
Teaching a college course on The Simpsons? Anytime I get to mention Foucault and a Simpsons episode in the same sentence, it’s a pretty good day. Click on the image below for the full podcast of the show!
Paul Cantor is brilliant, and certainly a highly-regarded figure in American popular culture studies (check out his book, Gilligan Unbound) – so this was quite a thrill for me! I particularly enjoyed his comparison of The Simpsons and Charles Dickens during the interview. You can check out an excerpt from one of Cantor’s essays on The Simpsons here.