The object of much debate, attention, and scholarship since it first aired over 20 years ago, The Simpsons provides excellent, if unexpected, fodder for high school and college lesson plans. There are many benefits to using The Simpsons in the classroom, the most obvious of which is that it's funny. After all, laughing students are hardly sleeping students! But The Simpsons also provides a familiar student knowledge base which instructors can use as a jumping-off point to introduce concepts ranging from literature composition to linguistics, the humanities, cultural studies, gender studies,...

First aired in 1989, The Simpsons has become America's most beloved animation. This collection of new essays explores the many ways in which The Simpsons reflects everyday life through its exploration of gender roles, music, death, food politics, science and religion, anxiety, friendship and more.