The comedy and complexity of campus life: Sonora Jha's 'The Laughter'
Let’s go back to the months leading up to the 2016 election. Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton are running for president. And here in Seattle, liberal English professor Oliver Harding has lots of opinions.
He hates the idea of decolonizing the literary canon. He hates campus safe spaces. And he’s sure Hilary Clinton will win the election. But Oliver’s world changes when he becomes obsessed with his colleague, Ruhaba Khan.
Throughout the story of Sonora Jha's "The Laughter," the plot twists and turns around issues of Islamophobia, sexism, and inevitable change in the culture of campus life.
The world of academia is one Jha knows well as a professor of communication and media at Seattle University. She sat down with Soundside host Libby Denkmann to discuss her newest novel, and why she chose to make her main character so unlikeable.
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Libby Denkmann
Host, Soundside
Libby Denkmann joined KUOW in December 2021 as the host of the midday show Soundside. She’s a native Pacific Northwesterner who grew up in Redmond, graduated from the University of Washington, and covered local news as a producer and reporter with KIRO Radio.
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Alec Cowan
Producer, Soundside
Alec Cowan is a producer for Soundside. His interests have brought many eclectic stories to the program, and his segments gravitate toward history, technology, arts and culture, and the environment. He's proud to be KUOW's unofficial "boat guy."
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Zaki Barak Hamid
Director of Community Engagement
Zaki leads the Community Engagement department, whose main goal is to facilitate connections between the various communities of the Puget Sound area and the content division, so that KUOW's news coverage is more holistic and informed by listeners' needs. His favorite programs include initiatives that facilitate understanding between people who might disagree with each other, such as StoryCorp's One Small Step.
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