Sianne Ngai is Andrew W. Mellon Professor of English at the University of Chicago. She is the author of Ugly Feelings and Our Aesthetic Categories: Zany, Cute, Interesting, winner of the Modern Language Association’s James Russell Lowell Prize. Her work has been translated into multiple languages.

Sianne Ngai has written an important book which harks back to the heyday of the leftist literary theory of the 1980s, and is none the worse for that. Dense and demanding, occasionally meandering, [it is] equally at home with I Love Lucy and conceptual art, Theodor Adorno and Jim Carrey… Laudable and ambitious… In order for art to fulfill its role and for criticism to survive, ‘aesthetic theory’ needs to develop new and powerful concepts which reflect both art’s changing nature and its ubiquity. This challenging and important book takes the first steps in this task.

Sianne Ngai is Andrew W. Mellon Professor of English at the University of Chicago. She is the author of Ugly Feelings and Our Aesthetic Categories: Zany, Cute, Interesting, winner of the Modern Language Association’s James Russell Lowell Prize. Her work has been translated into multiple languages.

Sianne Ngai has written an important book which harks back to the heyday of the leftist literary theory of the 1980s, and is none the worse for that. Dense and demanding, occasionally meandering, [it is] equally at home with I Love Lucy and conceptual art, Theodor Adorno and Jim Carrey… Laudable and ambitious… In order for art to fulfill its role and for criticism to survive, ‘aesthetic theory’ needs to develop new and powerful concepts which reflect both art’s changing nature and its ubiquity. This challenging and important book takes the first steps in this task.

Sianne Ngai is Andrew W. Mellon Professor of English at the University of Chicago. She is the author of Ugly Feelings and Our Aesthetic Categories: Zany, Cute, Interesting, winner of the Modern Language Association’s James Russell Lowell Prize. Her work has been translated into multiple languages.

Sianne Ngai has written an important book which harks back to the heyday of the leftist literary theory of the 1980s, and is none the worse for that. Dense and demanding, occasionally meandering, [it is] equally at home with I Love Lucy and conceptual art, Theodor Adorno and Jim Carrey… Laudable and ambitious… In order for art to fulfill its role and for criticism to survive, ‘aesthetic theory’ needs to develop new and powerful concepts which reflect both art’s changing nature and its ubiquity. This challenging and important book takes the first steps in this task.