Introduction: "you're about to be Gilmored" / David Scott Diffrient -- Authorship, genre, literacy, televisuality. "Impossible girl": Amy Sherman-Palladino and television creativity / David Lavery -- Branding the family drama: genre formations and critical perspectives on Gilmore girls / Amanda R. Keeler -- Your guide to the girls: Gilmore-isms, cultural capital, and a different kind of quality TV / Justin Owen Rawlins -- TV "dramedy" and the double-sided "liturgy" of Gilmore Girls / Giada Da Ros -- Real and imagined communities (in town and online). The gift of Gilmore girls' gab: fan podcasts and the task of "talking back" to TV / David Scott Diffrient -- "I wll try harder to merge the worlds": expanding narrative and navigating spaces in Gilmore girls / Radha O'Meara -- "You've always been the head pilgrim girl": stars hollow as the embodiment of the American dream / Alyson R. Buckman -- Town meetings of the imagination: Gilmore girls and Northern exposure / Jane Feuer -- Race, class, education, profession. Escaping from Korea: cultural authenticity and Asian American identities in Gilmore girls / Hye Seung Chung -- "The thing that reads a lot": bibliophilia, college life, and literary culture in Gilmore girls / Anna Viola Sborgi -- Stars hollow, Chilton, and the politics of education in Gilmore girls / Matthew C. Nelson -- "You don't got it": becoming a journalist in Gilmore girls / Angel Castaños Martínez, Amor Muñoz Bécares, and Sarah Caitlin Lavery -- Food, addiction, gender, sexuality. Pass the Pop-Tarts: the Gilmore girls' perpetual hunger / Susannah B. Mintz and Leah E. Mintz -- "Nigella's deep-frying a Snickers bar!": addiction as a social construct in Gilmore girls / Joyce Goggin -- Java junkies versus balcony buddies: Gilmore girls, "shipping," and contemporary sexuality / A. Rochelle Mabry -- "But Luke and Lorelai belong together!": relationships, social control, and Gilmore girls / Jimmie Manning -- What a girl wants: men and masculinity in Gilmore girls / Laura Nathan