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CATEGORIES IN JEOPARDY: ARGINUSAE IN ARISTOPHANES’ FROGS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 June 2022

Clara Bosak-Schroeder
Clara Bosak-Schroeder*
Affiliation:
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign [email protected]
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Extract

In October of 2016, less than two weeks before the election of Donald J. Trump to the White House, Saturday Night Live (SNL) aired a stunning installment of ‘Black Jeopardy!’, a recurring sketch hosted by Kenan Thompson as Darnell Hayes. In this episode, Keeley (Sasheer Zamata) and Shanice (Leslie Jones), two Black women, were joined by Tom Hanks as Doug, a white man and MAGA-hat wearing Trump supporter. Though Darnell is initially skeptical that Doug is prepared to play ‘Black Jeopardy!’ the four bond over their shared appreciation for ‘big girls’, lottery tickets, and Tyler Perry movies, and their aversion to dogs, corporations, and the government. At one point, Darnell approaches Doug for a handshake; at first taken aback (and literally stepping back), Doug then gratefully clasps the other man's hand. The sketch ends when a new category is announced, ‘Lives That Matter’, and the fragile bonds between Doug, Darnell, and the other contestants begin to fray. Doug announces that he ‘has a lot to say’ about the category. ‘Well, it was good while it lasted’, Darnell replies.

Type
Research Article
Information
Ramus , Volume 51 , Issue 1 , June 2022 , pp. 1 - 20
Copyright
Copyright © Ramus 2022

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Footnotes

This article has been a long time coming. First and foremost I owe thanks to Richard Janko for encouraging me to publish the paper on Frogs I wrote for him as a graduate student. Since then, many readers have offered feedback and support, including Zachary Biles, Kelly Dugan, Sara Forsdyke, Katherine Lu Hsu, Helen Morales, Ky Merkley, Matt Newman, Lakshmi Ramgopal, Ralph Rosen, Ariana Traill, David Wright, members of the Chicago Regional Workshop in Classics, especially Dustin Dixon and Jonah Radding, and members of the Premodern World Reading Group at UIUC, especially Craig Koslofsky for naming the piece. I am especially grateful to the anonymous readers who engaged with my argument and made such thoughtful and constructive comments.

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