This exhaustive work on flatulence breaks new ground wind on every aspect of abdominal gas in popular culture. A definitive taxonomy of farts details the characteristics of each variety, including barking spiders, cheek squeakers and green apple dirties. Philosophical positions on colonic expression are examined, from Confucius, Hume, Voltaire and the existentialists. Chapters cover a wide range of fart-focused stand-up comedy, cinema, children's books, toys and merchandise. The author's postscript describes a lifetime preparing for his subject through fraternity membership and offbeat assignments as a newspaper journalist.

Slaughtered along our highways and byways, roadkill may be observed by American motorists regularly, but aren't likely to be given much thought. Research scientists, animal rights activists, roadkill artists, writers, ethicists and lyricists, however, are increasingly sounding the alarm about its prevalence, reporting that we are killing the very animals we love, and are literally driving many of them to the brink of extinction. Detailing the death and destruction of our favorite mammals, reptiles, amphibians, and insect pollinators, this study examines the ways in which we are jeopardizing our own futures as our vehicles destroy wildlife large, small, and essential. Beginning in the era of the Model T, university biologists counted the common carnage of the time-cottontails, woodchucks, and squirrels, mostly-and that record-keeping continues today. But beyond reporting the bleak statistics, zoologists and their citizen scientist friends are both rerouting trails and migratory paths of animals and are advocating for man's best friends in our cat and dog companions. Examining these activities, this work illuminates both our successes and failures in keeping animals out of harm's way and what those efforts reflect about ourselves and our capacity to care enough to alter the road ahead.

The philosophy of public journalism, which has found converts in academia and in newsrooms nationwide, holds that traditional journalism is outmoded--values such as objectivity and detachment must give way to new values connecting journalists to their communities and committing them to a kind of reporting that will make public life go well. These new values, however, are not clearly defined, and even the main advocates of public journalism disagree on its meaning and purpose. This volume offers a thorough and devastating critique of public journalism by showing that its advocates have failed to diagnose what really ails American journalism and that their prescriptions for saving journalism are more likely to harm than to help the profession. After presenting the ideas and projects that characterize the major players in the movement, the author introduces the data from an extensive survey of newspaper editors and academics, as well as a comprehensive lexicon of public journalism.

Nuts About Squirrels is the first book to provide a comprehensive look at how the bushy-tailed creatures have found their way into the mass media, as well as in mythology and folklore of the past. Squirrels are ubiquitous media marvels and Corrigan covers their treatment in books, newspapers, television, movies, public relations, advertising, video games and more. Nuts About Squirrels is a fun read, whether you love or loathe these furry characters that inhabit our backyards, city parks, forests, purple mountains and fruited plains. They are all here: Nutkin and Timmy Tiptoes from the classic books of Beatrix Potter; Bullwinkle Moose's friend Rocky and the hapless Secret Squirrel from the television age; Conker and Squirrel Girl from the new age of video games. Nuts About Squirrels is not all fun and games, however, as the book draws on the insights of Marshall McLuhan, the media scholar who told us that the medium is the message - and squirrels do seem to fare better in the cool medium of television as compared to their depictions in the hot medium of newspapers. Nuts About Squirrels is a study that also shows how squirrel legends and folklore from centuries ago find new life and novel adaptations for movies, video games and the other new media of today.