Journal Articles & Book Chapters by Lucy Bennett
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Editorial overview of Transformative Works and Cultures, No. 18, special issue, "Performance and ... more Editorial overview of Transformative Works and Cultures, No. 18, special issue, "Performance and Performativity in Fandom."
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New Media & Society, 2014
As guest editors of this special issue of New Media & Society, we examine the concept of crowdfun... more As guest editors of this special issue of New Media & Society, we examine the concept of crowdfunding, where grassroots creative projects are funded by the masses through websites such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo, a practice that has been steadily gaining attention in the last few years, across many different sectors of society. We introduce the nine articles comprising the special issue and unravel the developments and challenges involved in these processes, concluding with suggestions for theoretical explorations and empirical considerations of the evolution and growth of crowdfunding within digital society.
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in Williams, K. and Williams, J. (eds) Cambridge Companion to the Singer-songwriter, Cambridge University Press. , 2015
The arrival of social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram have permitted and ... more The arrival of social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram have permitted and fostered new avenues of communication between some singer-songwriters and their fans. As Nancy Baym discovered, in her 2012 study of the online interactions between fans and independent musicians , social media are offering the possibility that ‘through the eyes of musicians, [fans] are revealed in part as relational partners. They may be distant ‘fans,’ relegated to interacting primarily with one another, but they may be people who become friends’ .
This chapter will explore how some singer-songwriters are using digital tools and social media to connect with their online fans and how understandings of participation and connection are being currently negotiated and formed. How the nature of the medium, that can invoke feelings of close proximity and intimacy , can be skilfully used in particular by musicians who write and perform their own material will be unravelled. Rather than focus specifically on one artist (though considering the online strategies and posts of musicians such as Amanda Palmer, Tori Amos, Suzanne Vega, Neil Tennant, James Arthur, and James Blunt) this chapter will give a wider overview of how some singer-songwriters are engaging with these social media platforms, the new opportunities for connection and participation with their fan bases that they offer, and the implications of these changing modes of interaction on relations with their fans and the creative process. I will argue that the confessional and personal nature fostered within the music of some singer-songwriters can compliment and lend itself well to communicative practices on social media platforms, with fans seemingly being offered striking and valued insights into everyday and ‘intimate’ moments of the musicians’ lives that were previously unobtainable for many. In addition, I will argue that Twitter use by musical artists can often reveal transgressive elements of the individual that previously had not been explicitly fore-fronted, or present as part of their public image, elements which can either enhance or shatter relations with fans and their wider online public.
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Journal of Fandom Studies, Apr 1, 2014
In 1992 Henry Jenkins’ influential work, Textual Poachers, was published, which contributed towar... more In 1992 Henry Jenkins’ influential work, Textual Poachers, was published, which contributed towards igniting the establishment of the fan studies field of research and re-morphing previous restrictive depictions of media fans. This article traces the work’s influence on my own steps as an early career researcher in the field and how it shaped my ideas and approach to scholarship. Speaking more broadly, it assesses the current state of the fan studies field, and how things have developed since Jenkins’ text was released. I reflect on what general fluxes, concerns and dimensions are currently with us, through a lens of the themes raised in Textual Poachers, most especially surrounding the development of technology and social media, methods in the field and fans’ relations with texts, assessing to what degree we have moved forward, or remained in stasis within fan studies scholarship. This study argues that technological advances have impacted on and shaped four key, often interconnected, areas of fandom and enquiry: (1) communication, (2) creativity, (3) knowledge and (4) organizational and civic power. Overall, this article shows how Textual Poachers is an invaluable source to measure the field and landscape of fandom, and determine the extent to which it has seemingly leaped forward.
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Celebrity Studies, Sep 2013
This study explores how modern celebrities increasingly utilise social media to mobilise audience... more This study explores how modern celebrities increasingly utilise social media to mobilise audiences towards philanthropic and activist causes. Achieving millions of followers on all social-media platforms, Lady Gaga is a timely example of how social media can be used as a tool to promote specific causes and to secure an active response from fan networks. This essay traces how Gaga has been actively engaged in a range of philanthropic and activist efforts that often work to address her fans as fellow partners and subsequently inspire many of them to engage in further initiatives. Incorporating an online survey and seeking to unravel the motivations and aspirations for this active engagement by fans, this study explores the relation of these acts to Gaga as the celebrity object of fandom and examines how she engages these followers through social media. The article also investigates how Gaga appears to reach those who have never participated in the philanthropy/activism realm before, with many making their first powerful connections with political figures and witnessing the change they can make as citizens. This study argues that the use of social-media platforms by celebrities such as Lady Gaga to communicate with their audiences can be interpreted as instigating a re-emphasis of the dominance of ‘the celebrity confessional’ and a reconfiguration of celebrity activism.
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Discourse, Context & Media
""Abstract
This paper analyses discourse, power and context on social media. Through a theoretic... more ""Abstract
This paper analyses discourse, power and context on social media. Through a theoretical discussion of the ‘Twitter Joke Trial’, we highlight the growing importance of understanding ‘individual communicative nuance’ (ICN) and complex power relations in the production and interpretation of online texts. But ICN is not the only problematic practice of online communications; there are other social and environmental factors that impact upon the production, consumption and interpretation of social media. Whilst adopting previous understandings of discourse, context and social practice we refine and apply models of panoptic and synoptic power that are applicable to the communicative complexities of the social media. These dimensions of power, we argue, are unfixed and shift according to the contextual environments in which they are produced and consumed. Hence, we show that critical discourse studies (CDS) can incorporate theoretical frameworks that provide the investigative and analytical approaches necessary for exploring power relations in digital media technologies. By developing this theoretical approach we propose the concept of synoptic resistance, which mobilizes oppositional power against authoritative surveillance. Whilst we do not deny that broader social structures maintain top-down power, we argue that ‘omnioptic’ media environments complicate these power relations in the ‘countercurrents’ they provide against authority.
""
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Participations: Journal of Audience & Reception Studies, May 2013
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Duits, L., Zwaan, K. and Reijnders, S. (eds) The Ashgate Research Companion to Fan Cultures, Ashgate , 2014
With over twenty six million followers on Twitter, a fan following on Facebook of over fifty two ... more With over twenty six million followers on Twitter, a fan following on Facebook of over fifty two million and a dedicated fan base on YouTube, American recording artist Lady Gaga is a timely exponent of how social media can be used as a tool by modern celebrities to connect and further mobilise their fan base. This chapter explores how Gaga fans, known as Little Monsters, are connecting with the star through social media platforms and ruminates on how the relationship between fan and celebrity is currently being affected by these new media forms. Building on work by Marwick and boyd (2011), and drawing on an online survey of Gaga fans that received 156 respondents, this chapter seeks to unravel the motivations and aspirations surrounding the online relationship between Gaga and her followers, adding valuably to our understandings of fan/celebrity relations . The study questions how fans perceive what could be termed as a ‘public private’ (Marshall 2010) self of the star positioned at the forefront of her Twitter postings, how engagement between celebrity and fan is negotiated and how fans subsequently understand their positioning amongst millions of followers on these social platforms. I argue that, in some instances, such as with Gaga and her fan community, the advent and widespread use of social media by stars is reconfiguring levels of connection and depths of engagement between both celebrity and their associated fan communities. As this chapter and responses from the fan survey will show, Lady Gaga is skilfully using the social media platforms in such a way that not only combines public/private elements of herself, but also speaks directly to her fans as fellow partners alongside her, who are positioned as making an integral contribution to her work. This process works to encourage, within some fans, powerful feelings of direct connection and importance, despite being one amongst millions of followers.
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in Burland, K. & Pitts, S. E. (Eds) Coughing and Clapping: Investigating Audience Experience, Ashgate Press.
Email me for full version of the chapter.
In recent years, the use of mobile internet and soc... more Email me for full version of the chapter.
In recent years, the use of mobile internet and social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and SMS text messaging has changed the live music experience for some popular music audiences quite considerably. Within music fandom, live concerts have been determined as constituting a “powerful meeting” place where individuals come together to “enact the meaning of fandom” (Cavvichi 1998: 37). The arrival of these social tools has permitted a powerful interjection into the behaviour within this meeting place, by not only allowing music fans to find and connect with each other, but also to tweet and text concert set-lists, photos and other information as they happen, thereby allowing non-attendees around the world to feel part of the event (Bennett 2012). This chapter will examine the process of texting and tweeting by live popular music concert attendees in an effort to connect with a non-physically present audience. Through empirical research, in the form of a questionnaire conducted with fans of prolific touring artist Tori Amos, the impact of this practice on the physically present audience will be explored, in an effort to understand and unravel the consequences of this process on their live music experience. I will examine the responses of those engaged in this activity during concerts, and how non users perceive it, in order to ascertain the extent and manner with which use of technological tools and subsequent connections with non-physically present individuals are changing, and can change, an audience’s engagement within the live listening process.
Subsequently, an important consideration of the study will be to ascertain what fans at live music concerts perceive is gained or lost by the incorporation of these emerging social platforms into their live music experience. For example, mobile phones are now increasingly held in the air during concerts, replacing the tradition of using cigarette lighters (Strauss 1998) and being “constantly present” (Chesher 2007) within the audience. I will question how this may disrupt the concept of “flow” which involved an understanding that, “the very conditions of live performance help focus attention on the music” (Csikszentmihalyi 1990 [2002]: 110) and and how the engagement of a live music audience is viewed as being affected and impacted by the new tools.
Finally, the analysis will also strive to question how the music and technological industries are working together to encourage this presence of the remotely located audience and to determine the subsequent effects of this on the physically present and their immersion in the show. With some music acts tweeting and texting their audiences during the show, offering exclusive access to online viewers, downloads of live performances, and encouraging the participatory use of mobile phones during some songs, I will explore how this impacts on the concert listening experience and expectations of crowd members.
""
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In recent years, the expansion and use of mobile Internet and social media have changed live musi... more In recent years, the expansion and use of mobile Internet and social media have changed live music engagement and fandom quite considerably. It has not only allowed fans to find and connect with each other at shows, but also to tweet and text concert set-lists and other information as they happen, thereby allowing non-attendees around the world to feel part of the event. This study examines the responses of fans engaged in this activity, identifying the key themes and patterns apparent within this behaviour, arguing that fans are using social media and mobile technology in an effort to contest and reshape the boundaries of live music concerts. It demonstrates how these online tools are involving fans that are not physically present at the show, seemingly incorporating them into the real-time “live” experience. This article explores how fans of prolific touring artists U2 and Tori Amos undertake this, with assigned concert attendees tweeting the set-list to online fans, where they gather to enjoy the show together, from the comfort of their computers.
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Continuum, Mar 21, 2013
In this article, I explore negotiations of power surrounding online fan cultural norms, by examin... more In this article, I explore negotiations of power surrounding online fan cultural norms, by examining how members within Murmurs.com, a community for fans of rock band R.E.M., protect valued meanings surrounding the band and their music. I demonstrate how normative fan identity within the community is driven by the notion of R.E.M and their music as holding value for the ‘thinking’ fan and explore the manner in which this is explicitly enforced when appearing under threat by what is termed in the community as drooling, which involves a strong focus on desire and the physical attributes of the object of fandom. Drawing on Mary Douglas (Douglas, M. 1966. Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concept of Pollution and Taboo. Oxon: Routledge. 2002 version), I show how this behaviour is targeted as ‘matter out of place’, a pollutant within Murmurs, due to its perceived contesting of normative behaviour and how the community uses powerful discourses of order and rationality in order to protect the norms and maintain the fan culture in its ‘right way’ (Jenkins, H. 1992. Textual Poachers. London: Routledge).
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Participations, Nov 2012
Abstract:
The growth and widespread use of social media is altering the viewing experience for s... more Abstract:
The growth and widespread use of social media is altering the viewing experience for some television audiences quite considerably. Viewers are increasingly integrating social platforms such as Twitter and Facebook into their TV-watching experience to collectively discuss programmes and live TV events as they happen. In sum, viewers are watching television with their laptops or mobile devices at hand, seemingly in an effort to transform their experience into a social, or community event (Makice, 2009). This paper will examine this growing intersecting media landscape of television and social media, considering the consequences of increased audience involvement within this convergence. Analysing the Twitter-led engagement of viewers of Channel 4’s 2011 Street Riots: The Live Debate, this study illustrates how Twitter is being used by television audiences and networks surrounding the live broadcast of a programme. I show how the viewing audience uses Twitter to express their views on issues within the debate and also on the show itself, the importance of “liveness” (Auslander 2008) and the extended tweeting audience, and how information and knowledge is circulated, in form of “collective intelligence” (Lévy, 1997). I argue that we can see these processes resulting in a change in viewership for many individuals, subsequently influencing the ways in which audience and programmes engage with each other.
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Participations, Nov 2012
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Keywords—Celebrity; Civic engagement; Fan activism; Fan networks; Fandom; Participatory culture; ... more Keywords—Celebrity; Civic engagement; Fan activism; Fan networks; Fandom; Participatory culture; Social media
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New Media & Society
This article explores the processes that occur when music fans reject the up-to-date flow and dow... more This article explores the processes that occur when music fans reject the up-to-date flow and download culture of the internet in favour of a more traditional first experience of listening to an album. Examining a sub-group within an online community for fans of rock band R.E.M., this article discusses how these fans assume non-normativity, due to their activities evading spoilers concerning the then forthcoming album. Driven by a nostalgic aim to recapture the experience of buying a new album without prior knowledge other than official information, this research shows how fans endeavour to resist technology and restore the experience of listening to and purchasing a new album as a singular event. The analysis shows how this pursuit of pleasure resulted in their cultural distinctiveness from the community and how it enabled them to create a form of inverted fan cultural capital, positioning them as a different, albeit temporary, interpretive community.
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Popular Music, Jan 1, 2011
(Online publication January 25 2011)
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Transformative Works and Cultures, Jan 1, 2011
How can strategies of governance in an online fan community be resisted by fans? By drawing on He... more How can strategies of governance in an online fan community be resisted by fans? By drawing on Henry Jenkins's application of de Certeau's concepts of strategy and tactics to fandom, I examine the regulation of normative behavior and show how fans can collectively devise tactics to delegitimize and reject strategies applied by the hierarchy, consequently becoming self-steering. To articulate these tensions that can arise within a fan community, I draw on a case study of normative fan identity within Murmurs, an online community for fans of left-leaning liberal American rock band R.E.M. I show how norms in the community are constructed through values of liberalism such as tolerance, equality, and goodwill. Focusing on how normative behavior in a community is not a given but is governed through strategies of power employed by the hierarchy, I explore how two strategies were successfully resisted by members on the basis that they subverted these values of liberalism. My argument demonstrates how the strategies worked to explicitly expose governmentality (Foucault's concept) within the community, with fans becoming aware that they were instrumental in a process of self-governance, collectively devising tactics, and steering themselves to reject the strategies. This has broad implications for understanding and predicting the power dynamics of other online fan communities, and in particular for formulating responses to implementation of strategies of surveillance and governance.
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The television programme Lost (ABC, 2004- 2010) uses experiments with time as an important part o... more The television programme Lost (ABC, 2004- 2010) uses experiments with time as an important part of its structure, to create quite a novel narrative development. This chapter, by focusing on a specific example of the flashforward employed in season three, seeks to examine how online fans of the show engage with, and respond to, the use of these devices surrounding narrative time and the rationale that underlies their participation in the program as a puzzle to be solved. To achieve this, I consider how these fans “read” and try to make sense of the show’s use of temporal play in terms of their placement as viewers following characters in past, present, and alternate timelines, often simultaneously. Exploring discussions by members of the largest online community for Lost fans, www.lost-forum.com, I illuminate the responses of fans initiated by the startling temporal narrative device and how some struggled with its inclusion.
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Journal Articles & Book Chapters by Lucy Bennett
This chapter will explore how some singer-songwriters are using digital tools and social media to connect with their online fans and how understandings of participation and connection are being currently negotiated and formed. How the nature of the medium, that can invoke feelings of close proximity and intimacy , can be skilfully used in particular by musicians who write and perform their own material will be unravelled. Rather than focus specifically on one artist (though considering the online strategies and posts of musicians such as Amanda Palmer, Tori Amos, Suzanne Vega, Neil Tennant, James Arthur, and James Blunt) this chapter will give a wider overview of how some singer-songwriters are engaging with these social media platforms, the new opportunities for connection and participation with their fan bases that they offer, and the implications of these changing modes of interaction on relations with their fans and the creative process. I will argue that the confessional and personal nature fostered within the music of some singer-songwriters can compliment and lend itself well to communicative practices on social media platforms, with fans seemingly being offered striking and valued insights into everyday and ‘intimate’ moments of the musicians’ lives that were previously unobtainable for many. In addition, I will argue that Twitter use by musical artists can often reveal transgressive elements of the individual that previously had not been explicitly fore-fronted, or present as part of their public image, elements which can either enhance or shatter relations with fans and their wider online public.
This paper analyses discourse, power and context on social media. Through a theoretical discussion of the ‘Twitter Joke Trial’, we highlight the growing importance of understanding ‘individual communicative nuance’ (ICN) and complex power relations in the production and interpretation of online texts. But ICN is not the only problematic practice of online communications; there are other social and environmental factors that impact upon the production, consumption and interpretation of social media. Whilst adopting previous understandings of discourse, context and social practice we refine and apply models of panoptic and synoptic power that are applicable to the communicative complexities of the social media. These dimensions of power, we argue, are unfixed and shift according to the contextual environments in which they are produced and consumed. Hence, we show that critical discourse studies (CDS) can incorporate theoretical frameworks that provide the investigative and analytical approaches necessary for exploring power relations in digital media technologies. By developing this theoretical approach we propose the concept of synoptic resistance, which mobilizes oppositional power against authoritative surveillance. Whilst we do not deny that broader social structures maintain top-down power, we argue that ‘omnioptic’ media environments complicate these power relations in the ‘countercurrents’ they provide against authority.
""
In recent years, the use of mobile internet and social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and SMS text messaging has changed the live music experience for some popular music audiences quite considerably. Within music fandom, live concerts have been determined as constituting a “powerful meeting” place where individuals come together to “enact the meaning of fandom” (Cavvichi 1998: 37). The arrival of these social tools has permitted a powerful interjection into the behaviour within this meeting place, by not only allowing music fans to find and connect with each other, but also to tweet and text concert set-lists, photos and other information as they happen, thereby allowing non-attendees around the world to feel part of the event (Bennett 2012). This chapter will examine the process of texting and tweeting by live popular music concert attendees in an effort to connect with a non-physically present audience. Through empirical research, in the form of a questionnaire conducted with fans of prolific touring artist Tori Amos, the impact of this practice on the physically present audience will be explored, in an effort to understand and unravel the consequences of this process on their live music experience. I will examine the responses of those engaged in this activity during concerts, and how non users perceive it, in order to ascertain the extent and manner with which use of technological tools and subsequent connections with non-physically present individuals are changing, and can change, an audience’s engagement within the live listening process.
Subsequently, an important consideration of the study will be to ascertain what fans at live music concerts perceive is gained or lost by the incorporation of these emerging social platforms into their live music experience. For example, mobile phones are now increasingly held in the air during concerts, replacing the tradition of using cigarette lighters (Strauss 1998) and being “constantly present” (Chesher 2007) within the audience. I will question how this may disrupt the concept of “flow” which involved an understanding that, “the very conditions of live performance help focus attention on the music” (Csikszentmihalyi 1990 [2002]: 110) and and how the engagement of a live music audience is viewed as being affected and impacted by the new tools.
Finally, the analysis will also strive to question how the music and technological industries are working together to encourage this presence of the remotely located audience and to determine the subsequent effects of this on the physically present and their immersion in the show. With some music acts tweeting and texting their audiences during the show, offering exclusive access to online viewers, downloads of live performances, and encouraging the participatory use of mobile phones during some songs, I will explore how this impacts on the concert listening experience and expectations of crowd members.
""
The growth and widespread use of social media is altering the viewing experience for some television audiences quite considerably. Viewers are increasingly integrating social platforms such as Twitter and Facebook into their TV-watching experience to collectively discuss programmes and live TV events as they happen. In sum, viewers are watching television with their laptops or mobile devices at hand, seemingly in an effort to transform their experience into a social, or community event (Makice, 2009). This paper will examine this growing intersecting media landscape of television and social media, considering the consequences of increased audience involvement within this convergence. Analysing the Twitter-led engagement of viewers of Channel 4’s 2011 Street Riots: The Live Debate, this study illustrates how Twitter is being used by television audiences and networks surrounding the live broadcast of a programme. I show how the viewing audience uses Twitter to express their views on issues within the debate and also on the show itself, the importance of “liveness” (Auslander 2008) and the extended tweeting audience, and how information and knowledge is circulated, in form of “collective intelligence” (Lévy, 1997). I argue that we can see these processes resulting in a change in viewership for many individuals, subsequently influencing the ways in which audience and programmes engage with each other.
This chapter will explore how some singer-songwriters are using digital tools and social media to connect with their online fans and how understandings of participation and connection are being currently negotiated and formed. How the nature of the medium, that can invoke feelings of close proximity and intimacy , can be skilfully used in particular by musicians who write and perform their own material will be unravelled. Rather than focus specifically on one artist (though considering the online strategies and posts of musicians such as Amanda Palmer, Tori Amos, Suzanne Vega, Neil Tennant, James Arthur, and James Blunt) this chapter will give a wider overview of how some singer-songwriters are engaging with these social media platforms, the new opportunities for connection and participation with their fan bases that they offer, and the implications of these changing modes of interaction on relations with their fans and the creative process. I will argue that the confessional and personal nature fostered within the music of some singer-songwriters can compliment and lend itself well to communicative practices on social media platforms, with fans seemingly being offered striking and valued insights into everyday and ‘intimate’ moments of the musicians’ lives that were previously unobtainable for many. In addition, I will argue that Twitter use by musical artists can often reveal transgressive elements of the individual that previously had not been explicitly fore-fronted, or present as part of their public image, elements which can either enhance or shatter relations with fans and their wider online public.
This paper analyses discourse, power and context on social media. Through a theoretical discussion of the ‘Twitter Joke Trial’, we highlight the growing importance of understanding ‘individual communicative nuance’ (ICN) and complex power relations in the production and interpretation of online texts. But ICN is not the only problematic practice of online communications; there are other social and environmental factors that impact upon the production, consumption and interpretation of social media. Whilst adopting previous understandings of discourse, context and social practice we refine and apply models of panoptic and synoptic power that are applicable to the communicative complexities of the social media. These dimensions of power, we argue, are unfixed and shift according to the contextual environments in which they are produced and consumed. Hence, we show that critical discourse studies (CDS) can incorporate theoretical frameworks that provide the investigative and analytical approaches necessary for exploring power relations in digital media technologies. By developing this theoretical approach we propose the concept of synoptic resistance, which mobilizes oppositional power against authoritative surveillance. Whilst we do not deny that broader social structures maintain top-down power, we argue that ‘omnioptic’ media environments complicate these power relations in the ‘countercurrents’ they provide against authority.
""
In recent years, the use of mobile internet and social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and SMS text messaging has changed the live music experience for some popular music audiences quite considerably. Within music fandom, live concerts have been determined as constituting a “powerful meeting” place where individuals come together to “enact the meaning of fandom” (Cavvichi 1998: 37). The arrival of these social tools has permitted a powerful interjection into the behaviour within this meeting place, by not only allowing music fans to find and connect with each other, but also to tweet and text concert set-lists, photos and other information as they happen, thereby allowing non-attendees around the world to feel part of the event (Bennett 2012). This chapter will examine the process of texting and tweeting by live popular music concert attendees in an effort to connect with a non-physically present audience. Through empirical research, in the form of a questionnaire conducted with fans of prolific touring artist Tori Amos, the impact of this practice on the physically present audience will be explored, in an effort to understand and unravel the consequences of this process on their live music experience. I will examine the responses of those engaged in this activity during concerts, and how non users perceive it, in order to ascertain the extent and manner with which use of technological tools and subsequent connections with non-physically present individuals are changing, and can change, an audience’s engagement within the live listening process.
Subsequently, an important consideration of the study will be to ascertain what fans at live music concerts perceive is gained or lost by the incorporation of these emerging social platforms into their live music experience. For example, mobile phones are now increasingly held in the air during concerts, replacing the tradition of using cigarette lighters (Strauss 1998) and being “constantly present” (Chesher 2007) within the audience. I will question how this may disrupt the concept of “flow” which involved an understanding that, “the very conditions of live performance help focus attention on the music” (Csikszentmihalyi 1990 [2002]: 110) and and how the engagement of a live music audience is viewed as being affected and impacted by the new tools.
Finally, the analysis will also strive to question how the music and technological industries are working together to encourage this presence of the remotely located audience and to determine the subsequent effects of this on the physically present and their immersion in the show. With some music acts tweeting and texting their audiences during the show, offering exclusive access to online viewers, downloads of live performances, and encouraging the participatory use of mobile phones during some songs, I will explore how this impacts on the concert listening experience and expectations of crowd members.
""
The growth and widespread use of social media is altering the viewing experience for some television audiences quite considerably. Viewers are increasingly integrating social platforms such as Twitter and Facebook into their TV-watching experience to collectively discuss programmes and live TV events as they happen. In sum, viewers are watching television with their laptops or mobile devices at hand, seemingly in an effort to transform their experience into a social, or community event (Makice, 2009). This paper will examine this growing intersecting media landscape of television and social media, considering the consequences of increased audience involvement within this convergence. Analysing the Twitter-led engagement of viewers of Channel 4’s 2011 Street Riots: The Live Debate, this study illustrates how Twitter is being used by television audiences and networks surrounding the live broadcast of a programme. I show how the viewing audience uses Twitter to express their views on issues within the debate and also on the show itself, the importance of “liveness” (Auslander 2008) and the extended tweeting audience, and how information and knowledge is circulated, in form of “collective intelligence” (Lévy, 1997). I argue that we can see these processes resulting in a change in viewership for many individuals, subsequently influencing the ways in which audience and programmes engage with each other.
THE FAN STUDIES NETWORK 2015 CONFERENCE 27-28th June 2015
University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
Keynote Speakers:
Dr Lincoln Geraghty (University of Portsmouth, UK)
Dr Suzanne Scott (The University of Texas at Austin, USA)
For three years the Fan Studies Network has provided an enthusiastic and welcoming space for academics in all stages of study interested in fans and fandom to connect, share resources, and develop their research ideas. Following the success of our first two conferences, we are delighted to announce our third annual event: FSN2015, taking place over two days at the University of East Anglia, 27-28th June 2015.
FSN2015 will feature two keynote speakers, both of whom have made a dynamic impact on the field. The first will be Dr Lincoln Geraghty, author of Living with Star Trek: American Culture and the Star Trek Universe (IB Tauris, 2007), American Science Fiction Film and Television (Berg, 2009) and Cult Collectors: Nostalgia, Fandom and Collecting Popular Culture (Routledge, 2014). The second keynote will be Dr Suzanne Scott, who, in addition to her published work on fandom in journals such as New Media & Society and Transformative Works and Cultures, is currently working on her forthcoming book Revenge of the Fanboy: Convergence Culture and the Politics of Incorporation.
We invite abstracts of no more than 300 words for individual 20 minute papers that address any aspect of fandom or fan studies. We also welcome collated submissions for pre-constituted panels. We encourage new members, in all stages of study, to the network and welcome proposals for presentations on, but not limited to, the following possible topics:
- Activism and fandom
- Pedagogy and Fandom
- Non technological practices in fandom
- Fan conventions
- Fandom and conflict
- Fan labour - Non-Western fan cultures - Ethics and methodology in fan studies - Defining fandom - Anti-Fandom and Non-Fandom
- Fan use of social media platforms
- Fandom (and) controversies
- Transculture and fandom
- The future of fan studies
We also invite expressions of interest (100- 200 words) from anyone wishing to host a short session of ‘speed geeking’. This would involve each speaker chairing a short discussion on a relevant topic of their choosing, and then receiving valuable feedback, making it ideal for presenting in-progress or undeveloped ideas. If you have any questions about this format of presentation, please contact Richard McCulloch at [email protected].
Please send any enquires/abstracts to: [email protected] by SUNDAY 22RD MARCH.
You can find out more information on http://fanstudies.wordpress.com/ or talk about the event on Twitter using #FSN2015.
Conference Organisers:
Lucy Bennett and Tom Phillips (FSN chairs)
Bertha Chin, Bethan Jones, Richard McCulloch, Rebecca Williams (FSN board)
27-28th September 2014
Regent’s University London, UK
Keynote Speakers:
Dr Paul Booth (DePaul University)
Dr Rhiannon Bury (Athabasca University)
Mr Orlando Jones (star of Sleepy Hollow, appearing for a virtual Q&A)
For two years the Fan Studies Network has provided a fruitful and enthusiastic space for academics interested in fans and fandom to connect, share resources, and develop their research ideas. Following the success of our first symposium in November 2013, we are delighted to announce the FSN2014 Conference, taking place over two days at Regent’s University London from 27-28th September 2014.
FSN2014 will feature three fantastic keynote speakers. The first will be Dr Paul Booth, author of Digital Fandom: New Media Studies (Peter Lang, 2010), Time on TV: Temporal Displacement and Mashup Television (Peter Lang, 2012) and editor of Fan Phenomena: Doctor Who (Intellect, 2013). His newest book, Media Play: Pastiche, Parody, Fandom, is forthcoming from University of Iowa Press. The second keynote will be Dr Rhiannon Bury, author of Cyberspaces of Their Own: Female Fandoms Online (Peter Lang, 2005) and currently writing her second book for publication with Peter Lang, entitled Television 2.0: New Perspectives on Digital Convergence, Audiences, and Fans. We are also incredibly delighted that Mr Orlando Jones, an American film and television writer, producer, and actor who currently plays Captain Frank Irving in Sleepy Hollow (Fox, 2013-) and vocal proponent of fan culture, will be joining us via Skype to participate in a virtual Q&A session.
We invite abstracts of no more than 300 words for individual 20 minute papers that address any aspect of fandom or fan studies. We also welcome collated submissions for pre-constituted panels. We encourage new members, in all stages of study, to the network and welcome proposals for presentations on, but not limited to, the following possible topics:
- Activism and fandom
- Producer-audience interactions
- Non-Western fan cultures
- Ethics in fan studies
- Defining fandom
- Anti-Fandom and Non-Fandom
- Fan use of social media platforms
- Fandom (and) controversies
- The future of fan studies
We also invite expressions of interest (100- 200 words) from anyone wishing to host a short session of ‘speed geeking.’ This would involve each speaker chairing a short discussion on a relevant topic of their choosing, and then receiving extensive feedback, making it ideal for presenting in-progress or undeveloped ideas. If you have any questions about this format of presentation, please contact Richard McCulloch at [email protected].
Please send any enquires/abstracts to: [email protected] by SUNDAY 1st JUNE.
Notifications of decisions will be sent out w/c 16th June.
You can find out more information on
http://fanstudies.wordpress.com/ or talk about the event on Twitter using #FSN2014.
Conference Organisers:
Lucy Bennett and Tom Phillips (FSN chairs)
Bertha Chin, Bethan Jones, Richard McCulloch, Rebecca Williams (FSN board)
of crowdfunding, where grassroots creative projects are funded by the masses
through websites such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo, a practice that has been steadily
gaining attention in the last few years, across many different sectors of society. We
introduce the nine articles comprising the special issue and unravel the developments
and challenges involved in these processes, concluding with suggestions for theoretical
explorations and empirical considerations of the evolution and growth of crowdfunding
within digital society.
comprehensive overview on crowdfunding, examining and unraveling the international debates around this increasingly popular practice. The book is suitable for courses covering media studies, fandom, digital media, sociology, film production, anthropology, audience, and cultural
studies.
a combination of Twitter and Foursquare to collect social media posts from attendees at the Glastonbury 2013 music festival and performed a thematic analysis in order to better
understand the in-situ use of such media. Our findings reflect the wide range of users' purposes in such settings and provides a basis for further exploration of this area.