“Don’t Fence Me In”: Connecting Irony to Power in the Scholarship of Charles E. Rosenberg

Irony and contingency are central to Charles E. Rosenberg’s scholarship and theoretical stance. Irony is a a way to speak through history both to power and to those who would contest power. The question becomes, What kind of politics is it? The limitations of Rosenberg’s ironic trope and its world weariness that can provide critique but no way to change is analyzed.