2024 with Anna Kornbluh & J. D. Connor
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The finale episode of our miniseries on corporate allegory was recorded hot on the heels of the publication of Anna Kornbluh’s Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late Capitalism (Verso, 2024). With numerous allusions to the book, Matt Seybold asks Kornbluh and City of Industry blogger J. D. Connor to consider the potential “perfect storm” of media disruption in 2024. Among the topics they cover are the enshittification of social, search, & and streaming, the investor-led rush to profitability justifiying downsizing across media sectors, the speculative euphoria associated with AI-generated art, and the eroding boundaries between media forms.
J. D. Connor is Associate Professor of Cinematic Arts in the Division of Cinema & Media Studies at University of Southern California. He is the author of The Studios After The Studios (Stanford UP, 2015) and Hollywood Math & Aftermath (Bloomsbury, 2018). He is also the author of the City of Industry blog.
Anna Kornbluh is Professor of English at University of Illinois, Chicago and the author of, most recently, Immediacy or, The Style of Too Late Capitalism (Verso, 2024). She is the most frequent guest on The American Vandal Podcast.
Matt Seybold is Associate Professor of American Literature & Mark Twain Studies at Elmira College, resident scholar at the Center For Mark Twain Studies, and executive producer of The American Vandal Podcast.
Theme Song: “This Year” by The Steel Wheels (from Under The Trees)
This season, The American Vandal Podcast is very proud to feature a song by The Steel Wheels, a band originating from the Blue Ridge Mountains. The song, “The Year,” is part of their 2019 studio record, Over The Trees.
On February 9, The Steel Wheels will be releasing a new album, Sideways. Both albums are available to purchase or download at their website.
The Steel Wheels are on tour now. Check out their schedule.
Episode Bibliography:
Sam Adams, “Why Suits Was The Most Streamed Show of 2023″ Slate (1.30.2024)
Robert Bruner & Sean Carr, The Panic of 1907: Heralding a New Era of Finance, Capitalism, & Democracy [2nd Edition] (Wiley, 2023)
Grace Byron, “Antitheory: On Anna Kornbluh’s Immediacy“ Los Angeles Review of Books (1.31.2024)
John Thornton Caldwell, Specworld: Folds, Faults, & Fractures in Embedded Creator Industries (U. California, 2023)
Jerome Christensen, America’s Corporate Art: The Studio Authorship of Hollywood Motion Pictures (Stanford UP, 2011)
J. D. Connor, The Studios After The Studios: Neoclassical Hollywood (1970-2010) (Stanford UP, 2015)
J. D. Connor, “Contraction: When Hollywood Gets Smaller” Los Angeles Review of Books (6.28.2023)
J. D. Connor, “Badwatching: Scenes From A Misspent Life” Los Angeles Review of Books (12.6.2023)
J. D. Connor, “Force Projection: Hollywood Pays It Forward” City of Industry (12.22.2023)
Corey Doctorow, “The ‘Enshittification’ of TikTok” Wired (1.23.2023)
Corey Doctorow, “Social Quitting” Locus (1.2.2023)
Jed Esty, The Future of Decline (Stanford UP, 2022)
Bobby Finger & Lindsay Weber, Who Weekly?: A Podcast
Christina Forgarasi, “Premium Content: On Anna Kornbluh’s Immediacy“ Los Angeles Review of Books (1.31.2024)
Jeff Horwitz, Broken Code (Doubleday, 2023)
Fredric Jameson, The Political Unconscious (Cornell UP, 1981)
Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (Duke UP, 1991)
Rebecca Jennings, “Everyone’s A Sellout Now” Vox (2.1.2024)
Anna Kornbluh, Immediacy or, The Style of Too Late Capitalism (Verso, 2024)
Catherine Lacey, Biography of X (Macmillan, 2023)
Casey Newton, “The Taylor Swift Deepfakes Are A Warning” Platformer (1.25.2024)
Matt Seybold, “The Trash-Text Tsunami” The American Vandal (12.15.2023)
Matt Seybold et al, “BookTube, BookTak, Wattpad, & Audible Creation Exchange” The American Vandal (10.12.2023)
Matt Seybold, Anna Shechtman, & Michael Szalay, “iLiberalism, The Morning Show, & The Sheeny Badness of AppleTV+” The American Vandal (1.22.2024)
Matt Seybold, Dan Sinykin, & Johanna Winant, “Close Reading, Conglomerate Authorship, & Qween Danielle Steel” The American Vandal Podcast (1.1.2024)
Dan Sinykin, Big Fiction: How Conglomeration Changed The Publishing Industry & American Literature (Columbia UP, 2023)
Babette Stolk, “Life Without A Post Office Leaves Montpelier Area Residents Scrambling” Vermont Digger (1.31.2024)
Barrett Swanson, “The Anxiety of Influencers” Harper’s (June 2021)
Michael Szalay, Second Lives: Black-Market Melodramas & The Reinvention of Television (U. Chicago, 2023)
Jia Tolentino, “The Personal Essay Boom is Over” New Yorker (5.18.2017)
Universal Music Group, “An Open Letter To Artist & Songwriter Community: Why We Must Call Time Out On TikTok” (1.30.2024)
Lakshmi Varanasi, “Google Is Getting Worse As It Loses Its Fight Against Search Engine Spam” Business Insider (1.21.2024)