About

Dr. Paul Alonso is a Professor in the School of Modern Languages at Georgia Tech, holding a Ph.D. in Journalism from the University of Texas at Austin. His research focuses on the convergence of journalism, entertainment, satire, politics, and digital cultures in Latin America. He has authored several books, including 'Satiric TV in the Americas' (2018), 'Digital Satire in Latin America' (2024), and 'Thirty Years of Entertainment and Politics in Peru' (2022). His work has been published in various academic journals such as the Latin American Research Review, The Journal of Popular Culture, and the Bulletin of Latin American Research. A former journalist for international newspapers and magazines, Alonso is also the author of four fiction books. Before joining Georgia Tech, he was a staff member of the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas. Currently, he is the director of Polivision, a bilingual multimedia outlet based in Atlanta that covers Latin American and Global Cultures. His areas of expertise include infotainment journalism, Latin American studies, media studies, popular culture, and satire. His teaching interests encompass Spanish language, creative writing, media studies, culture and arts journalism, and Latin American studies, while his research interests include media studies, digital media, satire, and Latin American cultural studies.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Law
• Computer Science
• Sociology
• History
• Art
• Computer Security
• Humanities
• Public relations
• Media studies

Selected publications

• The revolution will be hilarious: comedy for social change and civic power

  Critical Studies in Media Communication · 2025-03-10

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• Digital Satire in Latin America

  2024

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  • Political Science
  • Art
  • Political Science
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• Introduction

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-12-03

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  The introduction presents the topic of the book, theoretical framework, research questions, and main arguments. Drawing from works on satiric infotainment, cultural globalization, and digital humanities, this book argues that digital-native satire of the post-network era has become a unique type of hybrid alternative media that—in contexts of highly ideological polarization and sociopolitical crisis—articulates critical, distinctive, and nonpartisan interpretations of reality, inserting a much-needed, informed, reflexive, argumentative, or historically rooted perspective that amplifies democratic public discourse in saturated and discredited media environments. Adapting global formats and comedic references, Latin American digital satire also rearticulates local identities at the crossroads of sociopolitical and cultural tensions in relation to issues of race, gender, and social class, while navigating the limits of dissent in public discourse.

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• About the Author

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-12-03

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• How Female YouTubers Reshaped Journalism and Gender Discourse in Postconflict Colombia

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-12-03

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  Chapter 3 examines how female YouTubers have reshaped journalism and gender discourse in postconflict Colombia, focusing on the cases of <italic>La Pulla</italic> and <italic>Las Igualadas,</italic> two video columns hosted by the newspaper <italic>El Espectador</italic>. The first one addresses polarizing and highly sensitive topics in Colombia such as the long period of political violence and the national peace process. The second focuses on gender issues, tackling problems such as sexual harassment, toxic relationships, and limitations to women’s rights. This chapter examines the role of <italic>La Pulla</italic> and <italic>Las Igualadas</italic> within the country’s history of political and gender violence and the recurrent attacks on the press that made Colombia one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists. Placing these online television shows as representatives of new generational sensitivities against patriarchal structures of power and sexist/conservative media representations of political and gender issues, this chapter shows how these two online satiric shows have negotiated their space to develop independent critical infotainment and filled the informative gap left by traditional Colombian media. Finally, these online digital shows offer insight into a regional trend toward hybrid business models that combine traditional and alternative channels and resources.

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• Satiric Literacy and Marginal Sociopolitical Critique in Post-Fujimori Peru

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-12-03

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  After the fall of President Fujimori’s authoritarian regime in Peru, which heavily controlled and co-opted mass media, the newly recovered Peruvian democracy saw the rise of new irreverent television infotainment and satiric programs. These challenged aspects of the sociopolitical establishment while also reproducing conservative values and stereotypes through sensationalism and tabloid practices. The increasing visibility of the blogosphere, new digital media outlets, and emerging YouTubers opened the path for more critical humor. New satiric digital shows not only offered spaces for dissent, but also targeted ingrained prejudices and biases disseminated through mainstream media. This chapter analyzes <italic>Gente Como Uno</italic> (<italic>GCU</italic>), a niche satiric show and an experimental intervention that caricatured national television’s right-wing prejudices, and the character El Cacash, a popular YouTuber (and mock gang member) who hosts a satiric news show called <italic>El Desinformado</italic>. The first case introduces the notion of satiric literacy, while the second one illuminates the tensions of Peru’s recent political instability—corruption scandals, presidential impeachment, and the polarized election during the pandemic—giving voice to the younger generation’s saturation with traditional media. Through exaggerated or marginal personas, <italic>GCU</italic> and El Cacash use transgressive satire to question a long tradition of prejudiced national comedy.

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• Copyright Page

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-12-03

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• Digital Humor as Cultural Globalization in Latin America

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-02-27

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  The new wave of Latin American digital humor has become an increasingly relevant scene to discursively negotiate local and regional identities and question sociocultural values while developing a postmodern re-appropriation of transnational media languages and entertainment formats. This chapter analyzes two cases of political satire: El Pulso de La República, an independent Mexican online satiric news show à la <italic>The Daily Show</italic> created in 2012 by comedian Chumel Torres, who, after four years of producing his show independently on YouTube, transitioned as the host of a late-night show on HBO with a regional projection; and Cualca, an Argentinean satiric sketch show focused on gender issues created by Malena Pichot, a feminist YouTube star that became famous for La Loca de Mierda, a series of her homemade online videos about a break-up with her boyfriend that made it to MTV. These cases not only reveal successful models for the development of Mexican media, Argentinian media, and feminist humor but they also exemplify how cultural globalization and social media operate in today’s transnational entertainment and commercial critical humor.

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• Figures

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-12-03

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• Pioneers of Latin American Digital Humor as Cultural Globalization

  University Press of Florida eBooks · 2024-12-03

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  Chapter 2 analyzes pioneer cases of the first wave of satiric Latin American YouTubers with a DIY mentality who became popular in their countries and later in the larger region. It focuses on three cases: <italic>El Pulso de La República</italic>, an online Mexican satiric news show à la <italic>The Daily Show</italic> created in 2012 by comedian Chumel Torres; Malena Pichot, an Argentinean feminist YouTube star and creator of <italic>Cualca</italic>, a satiric sketch show focused on gender issues; and <italic>Enchufe.tv</italic>, an online comedy series that satirized Ecuadorian idiosyncrasies and local urban culture. In the contexts of the Televisa empire and the controversial election of Enrique Peña Nieto in Mexico, the #NiUnaMenos grassroots feminist movement in Argentina, and the tense relationship between the Correa government and the media in Ecuador, these shows questioned cultural stereotypes and sociopolitical norms, while adapting and parodying transnational audiovisual formats and entertainment genres. These early cases not only reveal alternative models for the development of Latin American independent digital media, but also exemplify certain patterns of how cultural globalization and hybridity operate in today’s transnational entertainment and commercial critical humor.

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Frequent coauthors

• Javier Calderón Sánchez

  2 shared

• Mendoza Gonzales

  1 shared

• Juan Carlos Rodríguez

  University of Almería

  1 shared

• Francisco Javier Gerardi

  1 shared

• Luis Pérez Rojas

  1 shared

• García Calderón

  1 shared

• Liu Jin

  Central South University

  1 shared

• Juan Ignacio Peralta Lorca

  1 shared

Awards & honors

• Fulbright Scholar Award (2024)