Fannish masculinities in transition in anime music video fandom
Keywords:
Cosplay, Fan video, Gender performance, Queer theory
Abstract
Politically engaged scholarship often interrogates the experiences of groups without privilege. But in order for social change to happen, privileged identities must also be reworked. An analysis of anime fandom in the early 2000s shows that fan works, such as fan video and cosplay performances, concretize masculinities that are both transgressive and desperately seeking normative confirmation. By means of queer and masculinity theory, I argue that fandom is a uniquely generative space for reworking masculinity. This will only remain true, however, if it can hold onto its subversive practices in a time of increasing mainstream attention.
Published
2016-09-15
How to Cite
Close, S. (2016). Fannish masculinities in transition in anime music video fandom. Transformative Works and Cultures, 22. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.3983/twc.2016.0713
Issue
Section
Theory
Copyright (c) 2016 Transformative Works and Cultures
TWC Nos. 1 through 24 are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 Unported License. For Nos. 1 through 24, TWC, not the author, retains copyright. For more information, see the Copyright Section.