A.J. Bauer (University of Alabama) giving guest lecture titled "Notes on Conservative Camp: The Perverse Pleasures of Consuming Right-Wing Media"
A.J. Bauer is an assistant professor in the Department of Journalism and Creative Media at the University of Alabama. He holds a Ph.D. in American Studies from New York University. He is co-editor of News on the Right: Studying Conservative News Cultures (Oxford, 2019).
Riffing on Susan Sontag’s classic 1964 essay in the Partisan Review, this talk asks: Why do we (academics, liberals, leftists) consume right-wing media? What perverse pleasures do we derive from it? And what might the strange appeal of right aesthetics beyond the bounds of modern conservatism tell us about how conservative news cultures interface with more prevailing cultural and counter-cultural forms? From the deliberate homoeroticism of Tucker Carlson’s End of Men, to Glenn Beck’s absurdist homage to Andres Serrano’s “Piss Christ,” to Jon McNaughton’s originalist oil paintings, this talk explores the bizarre sensibilities of modern conservatism in the United States toward theorizing their affective and political functions.
Time & Location
Jul 19, 2023 | 06:00 PM c.t. - 08:00 PM
John F. Kennedy Institute
Room 340
Lansstraße 7-9
14195 Berlin