We all know that TV satirical news shows play an essential role in unmasking political lies, promoting critical thinking, and fighting for free speech in an age under the spell of (new) fascist leaders. But did you know that by focusing so much media attention on apprentice presidents the same comics might also paradoxically (and against their best intentions) play in favor of the comic fascism they critique? If you read this article, you will know.
What do contemporary films tell us about the material effects of theatrical, cinematic, and digital simulations? This article considers Spike Jonze’s mimetic aesthetics in Being John Malkovich (written by Charlie Kaufman; 1999) and Her (2013) to diagnose the transition from a society of the spectacle based on embodied forms of mimesis to a network society in which digital simulations have material effects on posthuman bodies and souls, or hypermimesis. Full article available here.
