Week 10: Networking

Booth (2008) relates the way fans use MySpace and other social networks to express their fandom to de Certeau’s (1984) concept of reading as poaching. He proposes that the fan can create new narratives from existing texts by creating a new type of identity on MySpace. This is achieved by blending the fans offline identity along with their favourite TV or movie character creating a whole new persona (Booth, 2008, p. 516).  The idea behind social networking is that it encourages people with the same interests to become connected through an online medium (eg. MySpace, Facebook).

The Social Network (2010) drew attention to the way people like to interact online by creating their own identities. It is the story of Mark Zuckerberg, a Harvard university student who creates the social networking site Facebook. Initially he creates the network only for Harvard students, with the intention of allowing users to talk about college life, see who is single, and express themselves in an online capacity. This network gains so much popularity that he expands it to include more colleges, then more… and more, until eventually anyone (college or no college) at all can join. This shows how much power a single network can have. Today, Facebook boasts more than 500 million active users (Facebook, 2011), cementing its place in today’s modern world.

Large fan communities exist online, collaborating and creating entirely new narratives from the poached source text. For example, Dr Who (2011) is a television series that first aired in 1963 but gained such popularity in the sci-fi community that it now has an enormous world-wide cult following. Fan-Fiction websites cropped up all over the internet which allowed fans to share their own Dr Who stories (A Teaspoon and an Open Mind: A Doctor Who Fan Fiction Archive, 2010). The producers of Dr Who found this fan community a refreshing and untapped resource for writing new episodes, and decided they would produce what some of the fans wrote.

Another form of networking is transmedia - this is when one media text flows into another and may continue doing so endlessly. Disney often does this to appeal to children from every angle possible. Shrek (2001) was originally a motion picture, which has since become available in many different forms such as video games, toys, food, musicals, clothes and comic books (Shrek, 2011), just to name a few.

With high volumes of online participants, the possibilities of networking our own identities, and indeed media networking appear to be infinite. Who knows if we might all become writers of our favourite television series one day?

References

A Teaspoon and an Open Mind: A Doctor Who Fan Fiction Archive, 2010, ‘Stories Updated in the Last 7 Days’, eFiction, viewed 10 May 2011, <http://www.whofic.com/search.php?action=recent>.

Booth, P., 2008, ‘Rereading Fandom: MySpace Character Personas and Narrative Identification’ in Critical Studies in Media Communication, Vol. 25, No. 5, pp. 514-536.

de Certeau, M., 1984, ‘Reading as Poaching’ in The Practice of Everyday Life, trans. S. Rendall, University of California Press, Berkley, pp. 165-176.

Dr Who, 2011, television series, BBC, Cardiff, Wales.

Facebook, 2011, ‘Press Room’, viewed 10 May 2011, <http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics>.

Shrek, 2001, motion picture, A. Adamson, & V. Jenson, USA.

Shrek, 2011, ‘The Whole Story’, DreamWorks Animation LLC., viewed 10 May 2011, <http://www.shrek.com/>.

The Social Network, 2010, motion picture, D. Fincher, Massachusetts, USA.

Week 09: Othering

“Disability is a broad term within which cluster ideological categories as varied as sick, deformed, ugly, old, maimed, afflicted, abnormal, or debilitated - all of which disadvantage people by devaluing bodies that do not conform to certain cultural standards” (Garland-Thompson 2001, as cited in Campbell 2004, p. 445). Campbell argues that the portrayal of disability in media tends to focus around narratives of tragedy (the loss of ability) and optimism (overcoming disability at against all odds), while rejecting other narratives that do not fit this structure. This narrow portrayal of disability leads to stereotypical beliefs and prejudicial attitudes from the general public, marginalising those categorised as disabled (Hershey 2010).

Disabled bodies tend to be absent from media unless they are used to specifically portray ‘disabled’ people. For example, Glee’s character, Artie Abrams is confined to a wheelchair and dreams of becoming ‘normal’ again. This is depicted in a dream sequence where Artie gets out of his wheelchair and happily dances along with his classmates (2010).

This takes the normalcy away from being disabled, and reinforces the negative ideological categories mentioned earlier. 

                                          (Lupton, 2004)

Disability Arts Online is a space that allows disabled artists and critics to openly talk about and critique their social experiences. It is evident in these cartoons that they often feel patronised and disempowered by able-bodied people. 

                                          (Lupton, 2004)

Even when they are often more capable or intelligent than the able-bodied person, they feel they are expected to act incapable to a certain degree, in case of being perceived as ungrateful.

                                          (Lupton, 2004)

In order to create awareness, a disabled model posed with her missing limb in a recreation of a famous Wonderbra advertisement. She is wearing nothing but her bra and is accompanied by a caption that reads in French, “Look me in the eyes… I said eyes” (Bustraan 2010). This is asking the viewer to look beyond her amputated hand (her disability), and at her as a model.

 

                                              (Bustraan 2010)

 

More opportunities like this advertisement should be afforded to disabled people in order to display just how much they can oppose the stereotype of being ugly, afflicted or abnormal. These differences should be celebrated in media, as they make individuals unique and special. This could assist in dispelling the myth of a homogenous world where impairments don’t exist.

References

Bustraan, J., 2010, ‘Sizing up Disability in the Media’, Hearst Communications inc., viewed 2 May 2011, <http://blog.ctnews.com/robitaille/2010/10/21/sizing-up-disability-in-the-media/>.

Campbell, F., 2004, ‘The Case of Clint Hallam’s Wayward Hand: Print Media Representations of the ‘Uncooperative’ Disabled Patient’, in Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, Vol. 18, No. 3, pp. 443-458.

Glee, 2010, ‘Artie – Safety Dance’, 24 May, viewed 2 May 2011, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SG4WOUB3wB4>.

Hershey, L., 2010, ‘Media Driven Disability Stereotypes’, Mad Spaz Club, viewed 2 May 2011, <http://www.streetsie.com/media-disability-stereotypes/>.

Lupton, D., 2004, ‘Crippen Cartoons’, Disability Arts Online, viewed 2 May 2011, <http://www.disabilityartsonline.org.uk/crippen_cartoons_gallery>.