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An Ode to Fandom

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  From 'The Beatles' to 'BTS' - the rise of fandom culture has accompanied teenagers through their adolescence for decades but due to the introduction of digital media, fandom is having a much more significant influence on the world around us. In this essay, I will be diving into the influence that fandom has had on morality and online culture and applying modern media theories such as  'Fandom theory' by Henry Jenkins, his 'textual poaching' theory, 'the stars in our eyes' theory by Julie Klam, John Fiske's theory of audience importance as well as ideas proposed by other theorists.  I am going to be focusing my argument within contemporary fandom culture and particularly social media 'stans' however the ideas and theoretical evaluation proposed will be applicable over a wide period of time.  Morality, the distinction between right and wrong, is something that is inherently subject to change as time progresses. What was once considere...
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Celebrity Status

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  Lights...Camera..Action! From a young age, we grow up with stars in our eyes being sold the idea of fame from the television shows we watch at a young age about teen pop sensations to the front pages of tabloid newspapers talking about the latest scandals however 'Celebrity' is not what it seems. I am going to talk about what 'Celebrity' actually is and the detrimental nature of celebrity culture for both the celebrities, defined as a famous person, themselves and society as a whole. I will be applying key theories such as Richard Dyer 'Star Power', the concept of post-modernism and hyperreality and Fiske's power of the audience however the conclusions formed from my analysis on celebrity culture and online spaces will be applicable to scenarios that potentially do not reinforce or support the above theories. Before we get into it, I would like to recognise my bias as a western consumer and thus the validity of some of my conclusions may be weaker due to t...
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The Victim, The Villain and The Comedian: Disability in Film

Name three disabled characters that appear regularly on prime time TV… Now ask yourself if they’re played by a Disabled actor and finally ask if they’re represented positively. Are they unapologetically disabled? Or are they waiting to be saved from the grasps of neurodiversity? Or are they the ‘funny one’? Disability is undoubtedly underrepresented in the mainstream media with only 3% of series regulars on TV shows having disabilities [GLAAD, 2019] to put this in perspective that means out of 879 surveyed shows only 27 people on screen are disabled. Out of this 3%, 95% of the characters are played by non-disabled actors and a large majority of characters on screen fall into overused and ultimately harmful tropes concerning disability. This forces us to ask the question on whether disability is actually being represented on screen as well as what is prohibiting these companies from being more accessible; both in front of and behind the screens. In this essay, I will be focusing on The ...
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