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Meta Wagner

About Meta Wagner

Why do high-brow literary types love low-brow television? What can politicians learn from reality TV producers about manipulating the public? Has the dying romantic comedy genre been issued a DNR? These and other pressing matters are what keep Meta up at nights and provide her with fodder for her writing.

In her "Vox Pop" column for PopMatters Meta voices her observations about pop culture, particularly as it intersects with our lives. She is endlessly fascinated by the myriad ways in which our pop culture choices reflect back on us -- our beliefs, our desires, our idiosyncrasies, our intellects.

Her published pieces include written commentaries, features, and profiles for Salon, Boston Globe Magazine, Chicago Tribune, The Christian Science Monitor, and other publications. You can visit her blog here.

When she's not writing, Meta is molding young minds as an adjunct professor at Emerson College, where she teaches creative writing. She also developed and occasionally teaches a column-writing class at Grub Street, an independent writing center in Boston. Prior to her writing and teaching careers, Meta worked in marketing communications where she did (mostly) good works like publicizing multi-million dollar fundraising events for cancer treatment and prevention.

Columns

Vox Pop

Broads Don’t Blog, Especially in Haiku

[29.Apr.08] :. Broads can only thrive under certain social conditions, and those conditions, alas, no longer exist. But a new species has emerged...

Recent columns

 

Vox Pop

Obama, Clinton, and Cantaloupes

[2.Apr.08] :. The media will keep playing YouTube videos and speculating about politicians’ intentions rather than doing the hard investigative work -- simply because they can.

Recent columns

 

Vox Pop

A Return to Rhetoric

[12.Mar.08] :. Long past the days of the eloquent Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., or John F. Kennedy, Americans have rediscovered the desire to be absorbed by words, stirred by words, even awed by words, again.

Recent columns

 

Vox Pop

A How-to for Hillary

[4.Feb.08] :. How we want Hillary to appear before us says a whole lot more about us than it does about her.

Recent columns

 

Vox Pop

Trouble in Shopaholicstan

[10.Dec.07] :. If those slim hipped, cigarette smoking, small-portion eating, fast-walking chic Parisians are going to flaunt their fashion sense in Jersey while taking advantage of the weak dollar, then we really must seal our borders.

Recent columns

 

Vox Pop   Talk About G-generations

Vox Pop   Can't You Read the Signs?

Vox Pop   You Are Who You Know

Vox Pop   The Lost in Translation Generation

Vox Pop   Vexed by Beauty

Vox Pop   Surrender Yourself to the Attack of the Comedians

Vox Pop   Please Do Not Remain Seated

Vox Pop   Gender Divides

Vox Pop   People Substitutes

Vox Pop   Death Watch

Vox Pop   No! No! No!

Vox Pop   Feel Better than You've Ever Looked Before

Vox Pop   Gay TV: Making Same-Sex Marriage Safe for America

Vox Pop   A Need for Nerds

Vox Pop   About Those People

Vox Pop   When Harry Met Sally It Was Soooo Sweet!

 
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