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Jake Johnson

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April 2012

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What are you currently working on?

Jake Johnson Why musicals?

What kind of work do musicals do for people? Why do communities of all stripes reach for musical theater, of all things, to help tell the…moreWhy musicals?

What kind of work do musicals do for people? Why do communities of all stripes reach for musical theater, of all things, to help tell their story? What job do people hire musicals to do for them?

I am finishing a book that has been drawn out of this line of questioning.

Titled Lying in the Middle: Musical Theater and the Heart of America, this book explores how communities throughout America's Middle have used or continue to use musical theater to define their relationship with the past. Chapters in this book are ethnographic studies that each answer the question "why musicals?"--what purposes do musicals serve communities that are far removed from the purposes of Times Square?--concluding that America's heartland relies on musical theater to negotiate changes brought about by globalism, religious pluralism, and modernity in general. (less)

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