In this age of public confession and reality television, melodrama has become a pervasive cultural mode. This volume covers a wide range of melodramatic expression in contemporary life, from the public staging of personal suffering to the emotionalization and sentimentalization of national politics, in order to address a key question: if melodramatic models have become so culturally pervasive, what is the political potential of melodramatic victimhood and what are its political limitations?
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