Paul Flaig
Papers
1
Total Citations
5
H-Index
1
About
Paul Flaig’s research reanimates the overlooked intersections of slapstick comedy, labor, and animation, offering a sharp critical lens on how popular culture processes industrial change. His most cited work, “Slapstick after Fordism: *WALL-E*, Automatism and Pixar’s Fun Factory” (2016), argues that slapstick’s history—from Chaplin and Keaton to Felix the Cat and Mickey Mouse—was fundamentally shaped by Taylorist and Fordist labor regimes, with comic bodies resisting mechanization through playful automatism. By tracing this lineage to Pixar’s *WALL-E*, Flaig reveals how contemporary animation inherits and transforms these tensions, positioning the film as a meditation on post-Fordist precarity. Though his citation count is modest, his work punches above its weight by bridging film history, critical theory, and labor studies, offering a provocative framework for understanding comedy as a site of resistance. Flaig’s scholarship is essential reading for anyone interested in how animated bodies encode the anxieties and absurdities of modern work, making him a distinctive voice in film and media studies.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1