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ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

Politics? What Politics? Digital Fandom and Sociopolitical Belief

Ford, Sarah Ellen
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5652-8873
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1680273721387463

Abstract Details

2023, Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, American Culture Studies.
In 2020, people across the world began to live nearly all their lives online thanks to the global COVID-19 pandemic. Social media allowed people in quarantine and isolation to safely interact no matter where in the world they were. For some, however, this way of online existence had been happening for years. Fans of all sorts of media texts and media objects had flocked to digital realms for years as a way of finding others who felt the same way they did. Some fans choose to use their social media platform of choice to put forward a digital fan identity that fore fronted their role as a fan rather than any aspect of their offline identity. This work looks at the ways that specific social media platforms can impact the ways that fan communities form and how these communities can have impact on the sociopolitical views that users are exposed to. Using the sociopolitical touchstone of the Black Lives Matter movement in May and June 2020, this project utilizes a mixed-methods analysis of digital conversations across Twitter, TikTok,and Instagram. In comparing the three platforms it becomes clear that the unique affordances of each platform combine with unique dynamics of each fan group to privilege the voices and beliefs of socially acceptable fans. It also becomes clear that the distinctive affordances of each platform have the ability to shape offline interactions and sociopolitical ideals in different ways. We can see here just a glimpse into how the online can shape the offline in ways that have growing implications for our understanding of the social and political world.
Radhika Gajjala, Ph.D. (Committee Chair)
Andrew Schocket, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Yanqin Lu, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
226 p.
American Studies
new media; social media; fan studies; digital community; digital identity; Black Lives Matter

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Ford, S. E. (2023). Politics? What Politics? Digital Fandom and Sociopolitical Belief [Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1680273721387463

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Ford, Sarah. Politics? What Politics? Digital Fandom and Sociopolitical Belief . 2023. Bowling Green State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1680273721387463.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Ford, Sarah. "Politics? What Politics? Digital Fandom and Sociopolitical Belief ." Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University, 2023. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1680273721387463

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

bgsu1680273721387463
575
© 2023, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Bowling Green State University and OhioLINK.