I would like to consider a few notions relating to Henry Jenkins’ article on fan participation and convergence culture.
Through his micro approach to the study of culture and TV, Jenkins offers a prescient and hopeful analysis of specific (and creative) consumption practices. His focus on a dynamic relationship between new media technologies, media convergence, participatory culture, and collective intelligence forces him to look forward. However, his essay also discusses a previously explored problem of authorship (raised by Roland Barthes, yet, in a different context). Both Jenkins and Barthes champion the reader (of texts of culture). While Jenkins seems to view satisfaction and happiness as one of the end-goals of a viewer/reader, Barthes supports the reader’s right to read idiosyncratically and promotes literature that gives the reader an actively creative role (avant-garde literature). Just as Walter Benjamin questioned the notion of a piece of art’s aura, Roland Barthes famously eliminated the figure of a God-like author from the central place in literary studies. In ‘The Death of the Author’, he argued that we should focus our studies on multi-dimensional texts (and not the authors).
The logic of fandom and media convergence forces us, once again, to reconsider the meaning of authorship. As Jenkins argues:
“As we expand access to mass distribution via the Web, our understanding of what it means to be an author - and what kinds of authority should be ascribed to authors - necessarily shifts. This shift could lead to a heightened awareness of intellectual property rights as more and more people feel a sense of ownership over the stories they create. Yet, it also can result in a demystification of the creative process, a growing recognition of the communal dimensions of expression, as writing takes on more aspects of traditional folk practice”.
This notion connects the two worlds of fans and authors. However, what happens when a fan outgrows his peers, leaves his tribe, and becomes a world-famous author? The example of George R. R. Martin (‘Game of Thrones’) provides an interesting case study of a paradoxical reassertion of boundaries between fans and authors.
In one of the podcasts featured on his website, Martin starts a discussion of ‘fans’ with a confession: “I am a fan” (a confession similar to Prof. Jenkins’ autobiographical note on his website); “I started out as one”. He goes on to provide a brief history of science fiction fandom from 1930s to 1960s, along with anecdotes from science fiction fan conventions (photo gallery here) where “he found his people”. Clearly, he has remained hugely receptive to his original community (which inspired him to become a writer in the first place) and yet, he actively discourages people from ruining his works of art by writing fan fiction that explores the universe he created. He discusses fantasy fandom (full interview here):
“In one sense it's great; it's exhilarating to know that you have so many readers and so many people are anxious of the next book, and so many people are saying nice things about the book. There are dangers there as well. Way back in the 90s, the late 1990s I think was when the first website devoted to the series started. It was a website called Dragonstone, started by a guy in Australia. When I first discovered that (...) it was very exciting. Oh, look, they're actually paying attention. You're working hard on these books and you're putting in little things, foreshadowings or symbolisms or things that have double meanings. You're trying to hide things and these people are analyzing it and they're finding the things, and that's all great.
But it wasn't very long after that site started and I was reading it and enjoying it that I began to say, I probably really shouldn't be reading this stuff. For one thing, they're generating so many theories, that some of those theories are bound to be right. What do I do if I'm setting up a mystery that I'm going to solve in book six, and people have already guessed this mystery as of book two and they're discussing - - do I change it? Do I say, oh my god, they've already guessed it, they're four books ahead of me, I better change what I'm planning. I think it's a mistake to do that, because that's what you've planned. All the clues and the foreshadowing and the superstructure that you build is in place for that reveal, you can't change it just because someone's got it. So I sort of distance myself from the sites.
A lot has happened since 1999. There've been several explosions, the books have gotten progressively more and more popular. Dragonstone is long gone, but many other sites have taken its place like Westeros and Tower of the Hand, Winter is Coming, gigantic sites with many thousands of members where these discussions go on. When the TV show came along, that increased it by orders of magnitude again. It's exciting that it's happening, and I'm glad the fans are enjoying it. But I can't be apart of it. It'd be too much involvement.
And then there's the dark side of it, that you've referred to in the sense of proprietary feeling that some of the fans have in that…”
The case of George R. R. Martin raises the issue of a dynamic relationship between fans and owners of cultural property. One of the effects of the free flow of content across multiple media platforms is a new sense of how much the author owes his fans and readers. Do fans (who actively participate in creating and strengthening author’s artistic and monetary capital) get a false sense of entitlement or do they deserve more recognition?
More on Martin and his impatient fans in Laura Miller’s article “Just Write It” (http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/04/11/110411fa_fact_miller?currentPage=all)
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Sidenote:
Following our last week’s discussion about the rise and implications of neoliberalism, I would like to share a rather optimistic article on the US minimum wage increases (including a great infographic from The New York Times).
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