Final Project: How it's Looking right Now. Feedback Welcome

A thesis is like a scientific equation.  You need certain elements to come together to create a certain product. I am not entirely sure what the final product is going to be.  But I am now going to take this opportunity to lay out my ingredients on the table to see what I have and will likely end up with. This is not my final thesis and venue, but just me thinking through my ideas.  Lots of feedback would be welcome.

I want to somehow respond to my ideas on immersion from the midterm.  A good secondary term for immersion is engagement.  Using the terms more or less interchangeably, I define an individual's engagement or immersion within a fandom as a relationship with a fandom with the end goal of promoting a change change of value within the fandom, either for oneself or for the fan community.  Open immersion adheres to the values of the fan community and compromises with them to create value.  Closed immersion is only interested in the individual's veiw of how a fandom/fans should exist or behave and seeks to tear them down.

I also want to return to the idea of memes.  A fandom is a meme or contagious idea, as are the social morays within them.  Cultures have their own distinctive symbols, such as the harpoon or the line to Moby Dick's whalers, or Captain America's shield in the Avengers films.  Like these more physical symbols, there are also internal ideas that spread and change within a culture, like a whaling captain's responsibility to his crew or, to use an Avengers example, "COULSON LIVES!" It can be as simple as a joke or a motto, or as complex as a value judgment about a certain topic delivered by a community or an individual.  I want to understand how memes spreading within a fan community are a manifestation of people working together to add meaning to a fandom and pass judgment on media.  Thus,the  people create the fandom and not just the entertainment industry. (hmm, nice ring to that). Memes are a product of fan immersion.

The 19th-century whaling industry depicted in Moby Dick is its own culture and, in a way, a fandom, at least the way Ishmael regards it and the way Ahab works within it.  The difference between Ishmael and Ahab, as I pointed out in my midterm, is that one is openly immersed and the other is closed.  "Where Ahab errs, it seems clear, is in sacrificing others to his egocentric interpretation of reality[....] Disvaluing speech with other men in his desire for a dialogue with speechless nature, Ahab inevitably experiences the isolation that  lack of communication and lack of community entail" (Barnett 148).  Ahab closes himself off from all other interpretations of the White Whale than his own--human, natural, and supernatural--and charts his course of revenge accordingly.  The closed fan only interprets his fandom his own way and only opens himself to people or media that value his fandom the way he does.  Likewise the media producers that ignore the needs and desires of consumers are unable to sell their product or ignore larger opportunities for profit.  From my reading of the Star Trek Fan Phenomena, what made the difference between Star Trek being a failed TV show and the vibrant fan community it is today were the fans who incessantly clamored the TV networks for a continuation of the show--and that in the days when the internet itself was still the stuff of science fiction.  The digital age has turned fandoms into a force to be reckoned with.

 An open fan, however, is a breeding ground for memes, or in other words values other people's ideas about the value of a fandom and adds them to his own.  Ishmael is symbolic of this type of fan.
  "Ishmael [...] is purged of his antisocial feelings by his commitment to Queequeg and then [...]to humanity in general.  Intellectually saved by repudiating the narrowed perspective of Ahab's quest, and then physically saved by the caring of others, he is returned to a society whose common totems [...] he now willingly embraces" (147).
To put it more simply, Ishmael's experience in whaling culture re-fits him for life in human society in general.  A fan finds meaning and values within their fandom that they apply to real life and not just their narrow-minded quest for satisfaction.  Solidarity with fellow fans produces real-life relationships.  Fandom does not exist just for the sake of the entertainment but for the sake of well-being, not just for the individual but for the community.

My guinea pig for this project will be Marvel's "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D."  This is a brand new TV show that is linked to a fandom (ie Marvel's Avengers) that is currently enjoying enormous success, although the show itself is currently received with mixed reviews.  I will be examining the success or failure of SHIELD's introduction to fans as a new fandom of its own and within the context of the Avengers fandom, and compare this to fandom evolution in general.  I will also trace the fan responses to the show before it premiered, during the first few weeks, and also the last three or more weeks, between which periods there has been an interesting change in fans' reception to the series.  In other words, how are we seeing the SHIELD fandom being created and adding to the Marvel fan universe?

I am not sure where I would want to submit my paper as of right now, but I would like to submit it to some conference or journal dealing with media or entertainment studies or pop culture/fan culture studies.  I also want this research project to be of benefit to the people who are actually producing the show.  I admit, trying to give Joss Whedon a report about himself sounds like preaching to the choir--but I want to demonstrate my engagement with SHIELD by trying to produce something that could represent a unique form of feedback to the industry about how their product is working and why--in other words, to point out that we are perhaps experiencing a unique phenomenon in the history of fandom. Heck, if I wanted to I could present this at LTUE or a comic-con next year.

The results of this survey  (in other terms, after doing a lot of thinking):
fandoms (Marvel (SHIELD))+memes+fan immersion=a unique phenomenon
argument: The Marvel fandom has the power to make or break the show's success because (1) the Marvel films and characters have a lot of value to the fans, particularly Coulson, (2) the fans are working together to derive value from watching the show, (3) and at a certain threshold of involvement, they will either express common approval or disapproval of the show that will make or break it. 
Then, add something that people in the higher tiers of academia or the industry don't know: Tell you what, I'm going to sleep on that.  The fans create the fandom. Give them stuff to build with.  How about that?  I'll post my final thesis/venue/other main ideas tomorrow or Monday.  I have a headache.  And the hiccups. Bedtime. zzzzz.

Post-Midterm Mapping

No thanks to the time crunch last week, my paper didn't turn out as good as I would have liked it to, but my topic of immersion really caught Dr. Burton's interest.  In all honesty, I wrote about immersion because that was the topic that caught my interest.

 I would like to continue exploring the topic of immersion, partly to articulate my ideas the way I would have liked to in the paper and partly to see if there is actually evidence to support my claims.  I want to focus specifically on immersion in fan culture.  I think Dr. Burton got my number during the interview when he asked me to describe a digital subculture.  Fan culture is the subculture I am most familiar with and most deeply immersed in myself.  I like being a fan of popular sci-fi and fantasy brands because they give me something in common with other people, even if my tastes aren't quite as conventional as other fans'.  I feel like this is a topic that would give me an excuse for answering my own questions about fandoms and also exploring how fan cultures behave as, well, cultures, and how do people behave or immerse themselves within these groups or within the imaginary worlds they have in common.

I feel like since working on the paper that using the term "culture" has been a reminder that I am an anthropology minor.  In an anthro class I once took the professor once asked me what English has to do with anthropology?  Well, everything.  Language and literature are what make us human.  Referring to Dr. Wickman's lecture on Wednesday, the humanities exist to help us think and engage, and people who are immersed in fan cultures think and engage in specific ways because their worldviews are informed by certain media.  In a telephone conversation I had with my dad earlier today, he commented on my ideas about war and peace, justice and right and wrong, etc in the draft of a fantasy novel I am working on.  I told him that I got my deep ideas on these subjects from reading the Redwall and Harry Potter books as a teenager.  Within a fandom, fans engage with certain media that, via their immersion, give them reasons to think deeply about certain issues. 

I am also encouraged to go in this direction because I have other classmates discussing these issues, specifically Kylee, who wants to discuss fan fiction, and Mary, who is curating material on the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.  This is going to be exciting!

Conference Counsel

After reviewing my notes from the Sunday sessions, I came across the talk given by Elder Kevin S Hamilton of the Seventy from the afternoon session. He gave some specific counsel relevant to internet use and digital media.

• Good, Better, Best: Good activities are too often substitutes for better and best.  Satan can cheat us by having us focus too much on a good thing and ignoring the better and best. While he was specifically referring to online hobbies such as social media and games, I also see a way that his counsel can be applied not just to what we do on the internet but how we use the internet's resources.  Do we spend our time liking other people's statuses and entertainment posts without contributing material of our own--this is not just spiritual stuff, but also secular posts as well--that can uplift others and contribute to online discussions?  Do we use social networking to literally "network" in order to connect with other people and resources to find specific information and share ideas, as we would if we were doing a research project? In other words, are we optimizing the resources at our disposal for the benefit of others, or do we take these resources for granted? 
• Simple Decisions have Eternal Consequences:  This applies very much to decisions we make online as well as offline, including how we spend our time, what media we use and how, and what materials we share.  Why has the Church invested so much into online proselyting?  Because offline, it is often simple conversations or events that lead to people finding the Gospel and joining the Church, or in some cases becoming active again after a period of inactivity.  Likewise, with online proselyting, missionary work doesn't have to take a lengthy online chat session to convince someone to meet with the elders in person. It can be as simple as a tweet, text, status, or a shared link, video, or picture. You don't even have to be doing it intentionally!  As Dr. Burton mentioned in class today, sharing Gospel-oriented materials on social media sites can be as easy as sharing a post about watching conference in your pajamas to get the attention of someone outside the church--because it has your personal stamp on it and not the mark of the corporate Church. If the people who are seeing your status are your friends, they will recognize something you post easier than something blasted all over the net by a strange religious organization.  In the Saturday Session, Elder Arnulfo Valenzuela quoted Alma 37: 6-7. In the context of Elder Hamilton's address, this scripture has a double meaning: the simple things we do each day either draw us to Christ or pull us away from him.  Likewise, the small things we do to share our testimonies online--or to find answers to our own questions--can make a huge impact on the people who observe our example. 

 And here is a meme: conference is not complete without the memes, right?

I'd Like an Excuse to post More Memes

I'm not exactly sure what else to post about at the moment, so I think I will respond to Dr. Burton's response to my first post on memes, specifically these two questions:

"Behind their apparent silliness, what aspect of digital culture do memes reflect? Are they an efficient authentic mode of communication?"

Question 1,  (I feel rather like Ishmael the way I'm categorizing this). What aspect of digital culture do memes reflect? Referring to Dr. Burton's previous Wednesday lecture, digital culture, loosely re-defined from Charles Geer's definition, includes "visual simulacra, instant communication, ubiquitous media, global connectivity, and applications such as business and cultural and artistic responses." I think memes best reflect global connectivity and cultural/artistic response.

Memes are primarily a form of cultural/artistic response.  Memes are responses, period.  One of my odd quirks is that I like to know how people react to surprising situations, or how they have surprising responses.
I guess memes appeal to me because I'm a very visual person.  I have a great imagination, sure, but knowing what something looks like--a facial expression, a reaction,  an animal--helps me to have a better idea of what kinds of images attach to text or ideas--surprise, sarcasm, etc. And yes, if you want to get meta about it, sometimes people make memes responding to other memes. 

For instance, someone (not me) made this meme:

I made this meme in response:

and just to point out that I think Darth Vader would NOT find that amusing in light of how valuable those particular droids were.  Memes are about sharing ideas about shared interests, which is why they can so easily be "shared".

And with responses, I get a better idea of what to think of the thing being responded to.  For instance, if anyone remembers the classic LDS short film Johnny Lingo, when Johnny makes his uber-surpising offer to Moki (Mahana's Father), Moki's face is...well, blank.  Tulo, the comical narrator, tells Mr. Harris that "he looked as though a coconut had fallen on him."  Ever since watching this film as an adolescent, I have looked for that response in characters in other films, because the "coconut look" is definitely a sign of a humorous surprise.  For instance, here's an example about 24 seconds into this clip from a recent popular movie. : precious (PS I'm not sure what language the subtitles are in).

Also, for better or worse, the meme-making culture is very globally connected, in the english-speaking world at least.  Not only does this culture share a lot of history and stories, but it is also entwined with a lot of fandoms in which inside jokes will be recognized. Fandom memes can simply be fans helping each other recognize something interesting about their interest they never noticed before.

For instance, I used to work in the Student Athlete Building.  I would pass a picture of Jimmer Ferdette every single day, and after a while I realized this picture of Jimmer made me think of the Hulk.

And yes, memes are also a very integral part of mix culture: comparing different stories can be insightful, often in an amusing way.

There's also the hangup that memes cannot be created entirely anonymously:  most meme-generator sites require users to make an account.

Question 2: Are memes an efficient mode of authentic communication?  I would argue in the affirmative, but with limitations.  Memes often represent ideas from heavily entwined cultures and fandoms.  Sometimes you have to be a part of that culture/subculture to get the joke.

This is a meme I made:

You won't get it unless you have seen both Revenge of the Sith and Funny Girl.  It doesn't work if you have to go back and explain the joke. Memes are supposed to be quick.

BYU has an entire facebook site devoted to BYU and Mormon-related memes. It works well as long as you get the references.  Efficient? In some ways, when sharing ideas is enhanced by the illustration and people comprehend the meaning of (A) the picture, (B) the caption, and (C) how they are connected.  But efficient in the sense that they compart useful knowledge to us?  Well, perhaps in the sense that connecting useless knowledge can help us relate useful knowledge.
Authentic? Debatable.  Memes that float around freely online, on Google search and on Facebook, are usually anonymous.  It is an easy way to get anonymous popularity.

So memes are a reflection of the fast-paced, interconnected culture we live in.  It is fitting that they are both textual and visual.  And I would argue that they are effective as well as entertaining.