Description: An in-depth exploration of the ways in which the contemporary live UK comedy industry simultaneously encourages and resists the inclusion of women
Brief description: Ellie Tomsett is lecturer in Media at Birmingham City University, UK. She was researcher in residence with the UK Women in Comedy Festival (2014-2019) and is co-founder of Mixed Bill, a comedy and gender research network. She has published on feminist and postfeminist stand-up comedy, self-deprecation, and protest humour.
Review Quotes:
"This is a lucidly written, critical, and powerful book that documents the historical exclusion of women from the UK comedy industry and connects it to the present cultural conjuncture, where feminist comedy and affirmative action coexist with continuing marginalisation and a complexified backlash against feminism." --European Journal of Humour Research
"Informed by a wide range of empirical research, Stand-Up Comedy and Contemporary Feminisms offers a timely and important account of not only the challenges facing women comedians in the UK, but also how feminist comedy is finding new audiences and challenging orthodoxies in the British comedy industry." --Nicholas Holm, Massey University, New Zealand