Tamara Kay, "Sesame Street Around the World: Culture, Politics, and Transnational Organizational Partnerships" (Oxford UP, 2025)

·46 min·4 clips

Tamara Kay reveals that Sesame Street has never been pulled from a country due to controversy, thanks to its flexible co-production model built on mutual learning.

Sociologist Tamara Kay discusses her book about how Sesame Workshop collaborates with local partners worldwide to create culturally specific versions of Sesame Street. She explains the unique co-production model that prioritizes mutual learning and flexibility, contrasting it with typical top-down development approaches. The conversation covers how this model has avoided major failures while navigating cultural challenges like humor and safety norms.

As heard by us

A careful look at how Sesame Street travels across countries while keeping a few core social limits in place.

Tamara Kay frames Sesame Street as a format that can travel across countries without losing its core social rules. Local teams can change the title, branding, and characters, but the message stays fixed: no violence, a focus on tolerance, and a social-emotional center.

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Follow how Sesame Street changes shape around the world without losing its social messaging.

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