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Publication Deconstructing Gender and Media: A Mixed Methods Study with U.S. Early Adolescents(2024) Zhou, Cecilia Yuxi; Scharrer, Erica; Durrani, AlinaThis mixed methods study investigates conceptions of gender both in and outside of the media among a sample of 11- and 12-year-olds. Data from a quantitative survey and qualitative writing responses were collected and analyzed from 54 sixth graders at a U.S public elementary school. Results show that the majority held inclusive views of gender, indicating a recognition of gender inequities in media and society and a desire to challenge traditional gender norms. However, perhaps due to gender-typed content, stronger perceptions of the similarity of the people appearing in YouTube videos, commercials, video games, music videos, and movies to the self were associated with more stereotypical views about gender roles and norms in a weak but statistically significant correlation. This may suggest that accepting media representations as accurately reflecting oneself can still be linked to endorsing more traditional roles and norms, even within a sample with generally quite open conceptions of gender.Publication Emotional Realism, Affective Labor, and Politics in the Arab Fandom of Game of Thrones(2017-01-01) Alhayek, KattyThis article examines the Game of Thrones (GoT) fan phenomena in the Arab world. Although I contextualize GoT as a commodity within HBO’s global ambitions to attract a global audience, I study GoT Arab fans as an organized interpretive online community. I examine the Arabic fan Facebook page “Game of Thrones‒Official Arabic Page” (GoTOAP), which has over 240,000 followers, as a case study of cultural production and consumption by fans. Based on interviews with members of the administration staff of the GoT-OAP Facebook page, as well as textual analysis of the page’s posts, I ask: How is fan culture around GoT produced in the Arab world? How are the boundaries between being fans, media producers, and consumers negotiated? Are there connections between the themes of GoT and the current unrest across the Arab region? If so, how are they articulated? Through emotional realism and hybridity, I show that Arab fans find ways to negotiate their fandom of GoT with their local context and lived experiences.Publication The Cultural Cold War Goes "Vulgar": Radio Serial Melodrama in Post-Korean War South Korea, 1956-1960(2017-01-01) Kim, BohyeongThis study explores the birth of the popular radio serial drama under the Cold War doctrine of national broadcasting in 1950s South Korea. By examining texts, critiques, production practices, and writers, I interrogate how the anti-Communism propaganda mandate was negotiated in radio drama, influenced not only by the South Korean government and the field of radio production but also by the U.S. cultural Cold War programs and Americanization. As the result of historical contingencies within radiodrama production, the propaganda mission of national broadcasting morphed into “vulgar” melodrama, focused on romantic triangles and urban lifestyles. Whereas themes contrasted with the government intention, the genre effectively supported the purposes of anti-Communist propaganda by promoting the American way of life, wherein individual freedom was identified with capitalist consumer modernity. In this vein, serialized melodrama heralded an important shift in radio propaganda from direct and overt anti-Communism to a more ambiguous and recreational direction. This complex process is considered in relation to Americanization of radio writers and the U.S. cultural Cold War efforts, such as the Broadcasters Exchange Program.Publication Friends With Benefits: Plausible Optimism and the Practice of Teabagging in Video Games(2017-01-01) Myers, BrianRecent scholarship in gaming studies has challenged the field to investigate and critique the hard core gaming audience (stereotypically seen as straight, White, cis-gendered male gamers) in a way that does not reinforce either the perceived marginalization of gamers or broader social hierarchies of gender, sexuality, and class. This article demonstrates a way to acknowledge the complexity of this audience without dismissing its most virulent tendencies via practice theory and weak theory. Using data drawn from a qualitative survey of 393 self-identified first-person shooter video game players, this article looks at the specific practice of “teabagging” in online competitive gaming contexts. Ultimately, this article argues that drawing attention to the gaps and fissures that local gaming practices can produce in broader structures of gaming, sexuality, and class can help critical gaming scholars encourage and cultivate such practices as well as construct new, reparative alliances between different fields and communities.Publication Christine de Pizan's The Book of the City of Ladies as reclamatory fan work(2017-01-01) Nielsen, E. J.In what ways can medieval texts be looked at as fan works? How might the rhetorical tools of fan studies or affect theory aid in further understanding of these texts? Likewise, can we use medieval understandings of literary production to look at modern fan works in order to complicate our contemporary ideas of authorship? Here I consider how Christine de Pizan's The Book of the City of Ladies (Le Livre de la Cité des Dames) can be read as a reclamatory fan work addressing issues of representation and gender within both the texts it responds to and the larger culture within which the work is situated. Moreover, contextualizing de Pizan's work as fan work can help fan scholars by locating fan studies within a broader literary history. By reframing these earlier works of literature as part of a longer history of women's writing that also involves the works being done today within modalities of fan writing, and by reconsidering fan works as part of a historical continuum of women's writing, we, much as de Pizan herself did, create a theoretical space that historicizes, contextualizes, and indeed valorizes women writers of both fannish and nonfannish works.Publication Porn And Me(n): Sexual Morality, Objectification, And Religion At The Wheelock Anti-Pornography Conference(2008-01-01) Boulton, ChrisIn the Spring of 2007, I interviewed a panel of four men who, along with me, had just attended a national anti-pornography conference at Wheelock College. As we discussed topics ranging from masturbation to sexual ethics, many described their continuing struggle to reconcile their desires with deeply held moral beliefs and political convictions. This essay recounts various events from the Wheelock conference and draws on the published work of prominent male feminists such as John Stoltenberg, Robert Jensen, and Sut Jhally. I argue that, by failing to adequately account for the pleasures of objectification, the radical feminist analysis of pornography faces a dual risk: 1) remaining marginal and irrelevant and/or 2) being absorbed by the much larger Christian anti-pornography movement.Publication The mother’s gaze and the model child: Reading print ads for designer children’s clothing(2009-10-01) Boulton, ChrisThis audience analysis considers how two groups of mothers, one affluent and mostly white and the other low-income and mostly of color, responded to six print ads for designer children’s clothing. I argue that the gender and maternal affiliations of these women—which coalesce around their common experience of the male gaze and a belief that children’s clothing represents the embodied tastes of the mother—are ultimately overwhelmed by distinct attitudes towards conspicuous consumption, in-group/out-group signals, and even facial expressions. I conclude that, when judging the ads, these mothers engage in a vicarious process referencing their own daily practice of social interaction. In other words, they are auditioning the gaze through which others will view their own children.Publication Selling rural China: The construction and commodification of rurality in Chinese promotional livestreaming(2023-01-01) Zhao, LizhenWith promotional livestreaming transforming the digital culture and e-commerce landscape in China, rural streamers take this opportunity to not only harvest economic rewards but also construct rural identities and associated imagery. Employing a digital ethnographic approach, this article closely explored how rural spaces and rural labor activities are constructed and commodified in Chinese promotional livestreaming. I argue that although rural streamers’ creative use of platform-afforded liveness and interactivity enriches Chinese digital culture by making everyday life in rural spaces visible, this constructed rurality is, however, flattened, decontextualized, and romanticized – thus, ready to be commodified and sold to the audience. In addition, agricultural labor is made hyper-visible, generating the possibility for demystifying said labor process, while other forms of labor, mainly affective labor and labor for negotiation with the platforms, are made invisible, undervalued, and exploited, deepening the precarious condition of such platform-dependent labor.Publication Asian American Heritage Seeking: Toward a Critical and Conscious Study Abroad Curriculum(2022-01-01) Twishime, Porntip IsrasenaThe author examines the connections between education abroad, race, and belonging through a framework that is critical of U.S. empire. Drawing on her experience as a Thai American heritage seeking study abroad student and a former study abroad advisor at two different public universities, the author shares stories about race and belonging from semi-structured interviews with fellow Asian American heritage-seekers. The author connects these stories with the politically- and militaristically-driven development of U.S. education abroad programs and demonstrates how these stories confront the ongoing and historical processes that racialize Asian Americans as “perpetually foreign,” as in belonging elsewhere—Asia. These stories illustrate a need for a critical and conscious education abroad curriculum that addresses issues of race for all students. The author suggests that education abroad curriculum ought to cover topics including U.S. empire, race, and belonging, and that this curriculum can be developed in collaboration with ethnic and transnational feminist programs and scholars, diversity and inclusion offices, mental and psychological health professionals, and other experts in these areas. The author concludes with a list of action items that can move us toward a more critical and conscious education abroad curriculum.Publication Surveillance and the edtech imaginary via the mundane stuff of schooling(2022-01-01) Ciccone, MichelleThe use of edtech in schools is growing, as is a critical edtech research agenda. This research, combined with student activism, helps us understand the problematic impact of edtech and the way in which these predictive and coercive surveillance technologies pose a threat to students and educators’ ability to live self-directed lives. This chapter considers the use of QR codes for a digital hall pass system in one high school during the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to examine how seemingly mundane uses of technologies can have a significant impact. Combining insights from critical edtech research with media literacy education can help us understand how we might resist the edtech imaginary and exercise a different relationship to technologies in our schools.Publication Arab SF Film and TV in the Twentieth Century(2021-01-01) Kasem, DianaThis article defines the most prominent features and conventions of Arab SF film and television in the twentieth century by examining its narrative, structural, cultural, and production-related conventions. This includes the usage of folk literature and local mythology and certain SF devices, such as advanced medicine. In addition to breaking down the genre's plot devices, the paper looks at its history, its transitions from comedic to serious modes of narrative, and its evolution over the course of the twentieth century.Publication Collaborative Autoethnographic Writing as Communal Curative(2022-01-01) Alhayek, Katty; Alexander, Bryant Keith; Foster, Elissa; Ojeda, Carmen Hernandez; Mackie-Stephenson, Ayshia; Moreira, Claudio; Pelias, Ronald J.; Poulos, Christopher; Sutton, Timothy; Twishime, Portnip IsrasenaThis collaborative autoethnography reflects on how each author experienced COVID-19 and associated precarity. We explore the ways in which this experience relates to our identities (both particular and plural), and our positionalities in terms of privilege and marginality. As a collective of diverse collaborators, we confront dialectical questions of self and society. Our contributions reveal our advantage/disadvantage, mobility/immobility, and the borders and boundedness before/during/after COVID-19. We show the power of curative writing in collaborative autoethnography and how the sharing of our experiences of vulnerability represents an invitation to human connection.Publication What fear taught me: Resilient communication using art in applied contexts(2020-01-01) Kasem, DianaNarrating my reflections on the quarantine during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and my experience of the crisis in Syria, this paper studies the ways fear can transform into resilience by examining the self-reflexive works Path Out (Karam, 2017) and Another Kind of Girl (Jibawi, 2015). Using digital media, the creators of these works of art construct autobiographical, educational, and interactive narratives about coping and belonging in the course of crisis. I propose viewing both texts as examples of “resilient communication” that reacts to social and cultural issues brought about by crisis and suggests creative solutions that convey optimistic views of the future. Outlining the conventions of resilient communication, in turn, promotes the production of media works that use educational, creative, autobiographical techniques to foster collective resilience.Publication Don’t Smile for the Camera: Black Power, Para-Proxemics and Prolepsis in Print Ads for Hip-Hop Clothing(2007-01-01) Boulton, ChrisWhile much has been written on marketing to children, there remains a curious gap in the literature concerning marketing through children. This study considers print ads for three brands of hip-hop clothing for children (Rocawear, Sean John, and Baby Phat) that appeared in Cookie, a parenting magazine aimed at adults. I argue that, by depicting children in a “cool pose” of “flat affect,” these ads violate social expectations and assert "Black Power" through a para-proxemic challenge to the viewer. The result is a prolepsis — or foretaste of the future — which rhymes the child models with their adult equivalents.Publication Complexities with Bridging the Digital Divide(2022-01-01) Ciccone, Michelle; Brayton, SpencerIn our work—Michelle as a technology integration specialist at a suburban high school in Massachusetts, and Spencer at a community college library in Illinois—we have seen the digital divide impact students, faculty, and staff in intersecting and distinct ways. We understand that the digital divide in our communities stems from and reinforces entrenched inequities, and so it is of paramount importance that we work to bridge these gaps. Our backgrounds in critical media, information, and digital literacies also alert us to the ways in which “bridging the digital divide” can lead to practices that may be coercive, overly expose users to surveillance technologies, and result in information overload for students and employees. As we reflect on evolving understandings of the digital divide and the complexities uncovered when working to bridge these gaps, we acknowledge our own privileges and opportunities to learn more about this vast and important topic.Publication Binge-Watching as a Predictor of Narrative Transportation Using HLM(2020-01-01) Warren, StephenThis study explores the changing state of television by measuring binge-watching and its association with narrative transportation, using longitudinal data. The analysis based on a Hierarchical Linear Modeling found that the amount of binge-watching had a positive logarithmic association with transportation—the effect power lessens as binge-watching rate increases. Further, one’s typical binge frequency weakened the relationship between viewing session length and transportation. Overall, more frequent binge-watching reduces its effect power on transportation. Implications for theory and industry are also discussed.Publication The Co-Construction of Campaign Argumentation on U.S.A. Late-Night Talk Shows(2021-01-01) Reijven, Menno H.This study shows that when presidential candidates visit, late-night talk show discourse is argumentative and that this argumentation is co-constructed by the host and the candidate. Through their questions, hosts implicitly invoke arguments by casting doubt on the candidate's presidential bid. By treating the host's questions as critical questions expressing skepticism whether people should vote for the candidate, politicians prototypically use two types of argument schemes to defend their case. First, to argue that their policy proposals are needed, candidates use complex problem-solving argumentation. Second, to maintain that they have the skills and character to succeed as president, candidates use symptomatic argumentation. In their response, candidates also deal with other critical questions belonging to the argument scheme invoked through the host's question. Which critical questions of that argument scheme the candidate addresses in addition to the one posed by the host depends on the type of question the host asked.Publication Watching television while forcibly displaced: Syrian refugees as participant audiences(2020-01-01) Alhayek, KattyIn this article, I explore how Syrian refugees and internally displaced people are using social media to reshape interpretations of their own status through their engagement with quality TV texts that tackle the refugee crisis. I focus on the discourse surrounding the Syrian Television Drama series Ghadan Naltaqi (GN) [We’ll Meet Tomorrow] which is particularly interesting because of the dialogue that has developed between the forcibly displaced segment of its audience and the writer/creator of the show, Iyad Abou Chamat. Methodologically, this research is based on 26 semi-structured interviews conducted in Arabic language: one interview with Chamat, and 25 interviews with members of his audience who friended Chamat on Facebook after GN aired. I demonstrate that Facebook serves as an outlet for interactivity between displaced drama producers and audiences in a way that imitates the dynamics of live theater. While such interactivity is facilitated by technology, the emergence of this interactive relationship is owned to the desires for (re- )connection of both drama creators and audiences stemming from the alienation of war, violence and displacement. The particularity of the Syrian war-related topic in GN and its applicability to both the creator of the series as well as to audiences’ lived experiences evoked a significant level of online participation with Chamat. I use the term ‘participant audiences’ to describe the interactive, emotional responses of displaced audiences and their online engagement with TV content that address the disconnections they experience because of conflict and displacement while offering them possibilities for coping with violence, marginalization, and suffering. I show how the entertainment interventions of drama creators help displaced people both to mitigate the traumatic effects of a highly polarizing conflict, and to find a healing space from violent and alienating dominant media discourses.Publication “We have a big crowd”: The different referents of the first-person plural in U.S. presidential candidates’ talk on entertainment-political interviews(2020-01-01) Grimshaw, Eean; Reijven, Menno H.During U.S. presidential elections, today, interviews at late-night talk shows are commonplace. As political and entertainment discourse co-occur in this type of communication, we refer to this genre as the Entertainment-Political Interview (EPI). Yet, research is lacking in clarifying how candidates, through their talk, appeal to their audience on these shows to realize their political goals. In this study, the different extralinguistic referents for the first-person plural (i.e. we, us, our) are investigated in order to understand which groups are referred to by U.S. presidential candidates, how these groups are presented and how this positions the candidate with respect to their audience in order to construct a discursive presentation of the world. Namely, even as we is a deictic term produced by a speaker, the referent can still be any group of people including the speaker. Investigating these genre-specific foundational group memberships is essential to understand this mode of political discourse as the discursive world projected through the talk serves as the context of interpretation for the audience. To study possible referents of we in EPIs, we use the taxonomy developed by Dori-Hacohen (2014) as a starting point, as it classifies different types of we based on the exclusivity of the group referred to (i.e. everyone on earth (humanity we), a group including the speaker and hearer (general we), a group including the speaker but not the hearer (social delimited we), and a group just consisting of the speaker and hearer (conversation we)). The genre-specific referents of we are U.S. society (general we), desirable social groups and political teams (social delimited we).Publication Communicative Competence and Local Theories of Argumentation: The Case of Academic Citational Practices(2021-01-01) Reijven, Menno H.; Townsend, Rebecca M.When people argue in a specific context, they usually know exactly how to do that. The social knowledge participants have to form their expectations regarding the interaction is what we consider as their theory of argumentation. Elucidating the theories of the participants in argumentative exchanges is to formulate a local theory of argumentation. In this regard, we consider the ethnography of communication (EoC) as a framework to supplement our studies on argumentation. We believe there are three forms of social knowledge that affect how argumentation is conducted in context. First, participants know what is persuasive within their interactional context. Second, they know how this interaction is appropriately conducted. Third, they attempt to enact and recreate their understanding of the context through their talk. We use this framework to study citational practices in research. Each field has its own canonical authors. By citing them, academic practice reproduces the topics and audiences which have been deemed relevant. This is largely based on the norm that academic labor deserves acknowledgement. However, social structures may lead to exclusions of ideas and people, which are subsequently ignored. This is one of the issues raised after #MeToo. We consider whether in EoC acknowledgement should be given to other authors next to our canonical figure. We conclude that related research traditions like language socialization (Woolard & Schieffelin, 1994) and ideology (Schieffelin & Ochs, 1986) should also be considered within, and reinscribed into, EoC.