The Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) announces the publication of Public Representations: Screen Stories, Narrative, and the Public Sphere by Beth Herst and Sandford Borins.
It analyzes contemporary films and streaming series about politics, broadly defined, in the US, UK, and Canada, paying special attention to their impact on political discourse. Some of the films and series include: Lincoln, Zero Dark Thirty, Selma, House of Cards, Veep, The Crown, Borgen, several CBC docudramas about Canadian politicians (Pierre Trudeau, Tommy Douglas, Rene Levesque) and NFB documentaries about the Quebec separatist movement, female politicians, and indigenous issues.
The publisher is University of Toronto Press and the book is open access, so it can be downloaded in its entirety or in part at no cost.
Here is a link to the book in the publisher’s catalog:
Public Representations: Screen Stories, Narrative, and the Public Sphere
Sandford Borins
Professor of Public Management Emeritus at the University of Toronto and served as President of CAPPA from 2003 to 2007.
Beth Herst
An independent scholar and playwright and earned her Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of London.