Jane Austen's Satire in the Novel

When you dig beneath the more conventional I suppose romance plots in Austen's work there's a lot of satire hidden between the lines. Is this reflective of a wider satirical culture in literature at the time? That's a really, really interesting question. The best example is if anyone's seen the recently film Mr Malcolm's list and they have a satirical print that is made of one of the main women,. Julie Ethistlethway  that jokes about failed.