“Osama bin Laden Ain’t Here: Justified as a Post-9/11 Western"

Zinder, Paul ORCID: 0000-0002-9578-4009 (2012) “Osama bin Laden Ain’t Here: Justified as a Post-9/11 Western". In: National Conference Popular Culture Association American Culture Association, 11 - 14 April 2012, Boston, Massachusetts.

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Abstract

Justified, a postmodern televised Western narrative that unfolds in the contemporary South, utilizes character tropes defined by America’s response to the World Trade Center attacks of September 11, 2001. While the classic Western focuses on Anglo-American conflicts with the savage “Other” on the frontier, Raylan Givens, the protagonist of Justified, fights localized enemies with which he (and the viewer) can identify. As a US Marshal, Givens’ role as a Federal officer makes him an official of the American government, and his actions and the show’s representative criminals can be read as allegorical responses to America’s foreign and domestic policies since the 9-11 attacks. The proposed paper will give a close-reading of the two seasons of the FX series Justified, contextualizing the show’s character and narrative development as part of a new wave of Westerns released after 9-11 which engage morally ambivalent space.

Item Type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Additional Information: Paper presentation formed part of a panel session entitled “Defining the Western, Creating the Cowboy.” at the national conference of the Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association. Full Text also available on this repository under related entry http://eprints.glos.ac.uk/3558/
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Subjects: P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN1990 Broadcasting
P Language and Literature > PS American literature
Divisions: Schools and Research Institutes > School of Creative Arts
Research Priority Areas: Culture, Continuity, and Transformation
Depositing User: Anne Pengelly
Date Deposited: 12 Jul 2016 09:26
Last Modified: 09 Aug 2023 08:00
URI: https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/3752

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