Michael Warner is the Seymour H. Knox Professor of English and American Studies at Yale Universit... more Michael Warner is the Seymour H. Knox Professor of English and American Studies at Yale University, and his career has followed an interesting trajectory, beginning with the study of print and its importance to the emerging American nation and extending into queer theory and contemporary politics. There is an important line of thought that connects three of Michael Warner’s books: The Letters of the Republic (1990), Publics and Counterpublics (2002), and The Trouble with Normal (1999). In The Letters of the Republic, Warner begins to outline the way in which publics emerge and are discursively produced. In Publics and Counterpublics, he more thoroughly engages both the production of normative publics and the resistant communities of counterpublics, the latter of which he often illustrates with examples drawn from queer communities. Finally, in The Trouble with Normal, Warner challenges the efforts of gay and lesbian rights advocates to accommodate and assimilate to heteronormative standards in an effort to join the public constituted by the dominant heterosexual society. As he notes, these efforts effectively undermine the transformative qualities that queerness can bring to a society in refiguring the way sex and relationships are regarded. In effect, The Trouble with Normal seems to be a queer, counterpublic polemic, one that mirrors (in purpose, if not in content) the emerging revolutionary discourse in 18th-century America. In addition, Warner provides some valuable perspectives on the development of public discourse in American, and makes several observations that pre-date, yet bring into sharp relief, some of the issues and concerns that have been raised about social media.
Page 1. Robert Alan Brookey DigitAl ConveRgenCe in the Film AnD viDeo gAme inDustRies hollywood g... more Page 1. Robert Alan Brookey DigitAl ConveRgenCe in the Film AnD viDeo gAme inDustRies hollywood gamers Page 2. hollywood gamers one recto runningfoot | i Page 3. ii | verso runningfoot Page 4. robert alan brookey hollywood ...
A "gunman" uses automatic weapons and opens fire on a crowd of concert goers in Las Vegas, Nevada... more A "gunman" uses automatic weapons and opens fire on a crowd of concert goers in Las Vegas, Nevada, killing 58 persons and injuring 546 people. ISIS's claim of responsibility for the violence that killed and injured hundreds of people in Las Vegas was received skeptically and interpreted as "somewhat of a joke among the rank-and-file of the international terrorist elite" and a "sign of desperation" (Smith, 2017). If the first day of October ushered in a time that ISIS was dismissed as a joke, the last day of the month changed the narrative. October 31, 2017: Sayfullo Saipov, an Uzbek national with permanent residency in the U.S., uses a rented truck to crush pedestrians in a bike lane in Manhattan, New York. Upon the discovery of his religious identity and his ideological affiliation with ISIS he is immediately declared a terrorist. Although authorities could find no communication between him and the terrorist group, it became clear that "ISIS's propaganda was sufficient to animate Saipov to carry out the worst terrorist attack in New York since 9/11" (Wright, 2017). As Wright (2017) reported: According to the ten-page federal complaint filed against him, Saipov fell under the ISIS spell by viewing some ninety ISIS-related videos and almost four thousand images on his (at least two) cell phones. He was specifically inspired by issue No. 3 of the slick online magazine Rumiyah, which means "Rome," an allusion to an old prophecy foretelling the fall of the infidel West.
Historically Muncie, Indiana has been known as Middletown, USA. This documentary tells the story ... more Historically Muncie, Indiana has been known as Middletown, USA. This documentary tells the story of how an average American town came to have an extraordinary art museum. David T. Owsley, a surviving grandson of the famous industrialist and philanthropist Frank C. Ball, has continued his grandfather’s tradition of donating to the art museum on the Ball State University campus. The Gift of David T. Owsley chronicles his journey to become an art museum curator, and personal collector of art. The documentary also illustrates the impact that Owsley’s contributions to the museum have had on the community of Muncie and the students of Ball State.
Michael Warner is the Seymour H. Knox Professor of English and American Studies at Yale Universit... more Michael Warner is the Seymour H. Knox Professor of English and American Studies at Yale University, and his career has followed an interesting trajectory, beginning with the study of print and its importance to the emerging American nation and extending into queer theory and contemporary politics. There is an important line of thought that connects three of Michael Warner’s books: The Letters of the Republic (1990), Publics and Counterpublics (2002), and The Trouble with Normal (1999). In The Letters of the Republic, Warner begins to outline the way in which publics emerge and are discursively produced. In Publics and Counterpublics, he more thoroughly engages both the production of normative publics and the resistant communities of counterpublics, the latter of which he often illustrates with examples drawn from queer communities. Finally, in The Trouble with Normal, Warner challenges the efforts of gay and lesbian rights advocates to accommodate and assimilate to heteronormative standards in an effort to join the public constituted by the dominant heterosexual society. As he notes, these efforts effectively undermine the transformative qualities that queerness can bring to a society in refiguring the way sex and relationships are regarded. In effect, The Trouble with Normal seems to be a queer, counterpublic polemic, one that mirrors (in purpose, if not in content) the emerging revolutionary discourse in 18th-century America. In addition, Warner provides some valuable perspectives on the development of public discourse in American, and makes several observations that pre-date, yet bring into sharp relief, some of the issues and concerns that have been raised about social media.
Page 1. Robert Alan Brookey DigitAl ConveRgenCe in the Film AnD viDeo gAme inDustRies hollywood g... more Page 1. Robert Alan Brookey DigitAl ConveRgenCe in the Film AnD viDeo gAme inDustRies hollywood gamers Page 2. hollywood gamers one recto runningfoot | i Page 3. ii | verso runningfoot Page 4. robert alan brookey hollywood ...
A "gunman" uses automatic weapons and opens fire on a crowd of concert goers in Las Vegas, Nevada... more A "gunman" uses automatic weapons and opens fire on a crowd of concert goers in Las Vegas, Nevada, killing 58 persons and injuring 546 people. ISIS's claim of responsibility for the violence that killed and injured hundreds of people in Las Vegas was received skeptically and interpreted as "somewhat of a joke among the rank-and-file of the international terrorist elite" and a "sign of desperation" (Smith, 2017). If the first day of October ushered in a time that ISIS was dismissed as a joke, the last day of the month changed the narrative. October 31, 2017: Sayfullo Saipov, an Uzbek national with permanent residency in the U.S., uses a rented truck to crush pedestrians in a bike lane in Manhattan, New York. Upon the discovery of his religious identity and his ideological affiliation with ISIS he is immediately declared a terrorist. Although authorities could find no communication between him and the terrorist group, it became clear that "ISIS's propaganda was sufficient to animate Saipov to carry out the worst terrorist attack in New York since 9/11" (Wright, 2017). As Wright (2017) reported: According to the ten-page federal complaint filed against him, Saipov fell under the ISIS spell by viewing some ninety ISIS-related videos and almost four thousand images on his (at least two) cell phones. He was specifically inspired by issue No. 3 of the slick online magazine Rumiyah, which means "Rome," an allusion to an old prophecy foretelling the fall of the infidel West.
Historically Muncie, Indiana has been known as Middletown, USA. This documentary tells the story ... more Historically Muncie, Indiana has been known as Middletown, USA. This documentary tells the story of how an average American town came to have an extraordinary art museum. David T. Owsley, a surviving grandson of the famous industrialist and philanthropist Frank C. Ball, has continued his grandfather’s tradition of donating to the art museum on the Ball State University campus. The Gift of David T. Owsley chronicles his journey to become an art museum curator, and personal collector of art. The documentary also illustrates the impact that Owsley’s contributions to the museum have had on the community of Muncie and the students of Ball State.
On June 20, 2009, in the bloody aftermath of the disputed presidential election in Iran, the kill... more On June 20, 2009, in the bloody aftermath of the disputed presidential election in Iran, the killing of a young woman, captured by mobile phone cameras, was declared "iconic." The footage of Neda Agha-Soltan's death was hailed as citizen journalism. We discuss the image of Neda and its circulation in the Western media by focusing on For Neda, a widely distributed nonfiction narrative, produced by HBO. We argue that although citizen journalism via viral videos can provide visibility, it is the legacy media that provide the larger narrative, inflecting the narrative with ideological investments. After discussing geopolitical context, we explain Neda's image and For Neda with respect to the narrative of rescuing Muslim women and such rescue in postfeminist terms.
In this book, Brookey acknowledges a singular goal-"to examine the evidence on which the biologic... more In this book, Brookey acknowledges a singular goal-"to examine the evidence on which the biological arguments constituting the gay gene discourse are based" (p. 118). He
When I began my editorship, I wanted to create a special forum for my first issue in which a vari... more When I began my editorship, I wanted to create a special forum for my first issue in which a variety of scholars, at different points in their careers, contributed short pieces on their next research projects. I had approached Brian Ott about a contribution, and later, when I was invited to Texas Tech for a lecture, he and I discussed his possible contribution over dinner. He told me that he was thinking about two potential projects. The first, he explained, was an analysis of Trump's Twitter feed. I don't recall his second idea, and I may have stopped listening. I knew an analysis of Trump's Twitter feed would be timely, and perhaps prescient, but I could have never imagined to what degree. Brian may not have either, and the response to his essay has surprised us both. Indeed, the political conditions that have driven interest in "The Age of Twitter: Donald J. Trump and the Politics of Debasement" have also surprised us. This interest has led Brian to undertake a book-length study of Trump's rhetoric, The Twitter Presidency: Donald J. Trump and the politics of white rage, which he co-authored with Greg Dickinson at Col-orado State University. The book is the inaugural volume in NCA's Studies in Communication series. Seeing as how this project began with Brian's essay for CSMC, I decided to interview him about the book and his latest thoughts on our political climate.
Our industries are undergoing a significant disruption with the introduction of several new strea... more Our industries are undergoing a significant disruption with the introduction of several new streaming services. Both Disney+ and Apple TV+ were introduced in 2019, while NBC/Universal's Peacock and WarnerMedia launched HBO Max in May 2020. These streaming services are in addition to the established ones, including Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video and CBS All Access (rebranded as Paramount+ in 2021). Smaller services are also available including Discovery+, AMC+, YouTube TV, Roku and Pluto TV. The shift to these services has been accelerated during the COVID pandemic, which upended the distribution models for both film and television.
Our industries are undergoing a significant disruption with the introduction of several new strea... more Our industries are undergoing a significant disruption with the introduction of several new streaming services. Both Disney+ and Apple TV+ were introduced in 2019, while NBC/Universal's Peacock and WarnerMedia launched HBO Max in May 2020. These streaming services are in addition to the established ones, including Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video and CBS All Access (rebranded as Paramount+ in 2021). Smaller services are also available including Discovery+, AMC+, YouTube TV, Roku and Pluto TV. The shift to these services has been accelerated during the COVID pandemic, which upended the distribution models for both film and television. This symposium will be an opportunity for scholars to consider the different implications of the rise of streaming services. Already we can see how streaming has changed the industry. For example, Disney's acquisition of Fox was in preparation for the launch of Disney+, and resulted in a significant consolidation of the media industry. Labor issues and compensation have been driven by the shift to streaming, and these concerns were central to the conflict between the Writers Guild of America (WGA) members and their agents. The divide between networks and affiliates has been broadened given that streaming content renders those legacy media relationships obsolete. Finally, there are a variety of business models behind these services that defy the traditional advertising models. Contributions to the symposium can analyze a specific platform, or engage broader issues surrounding the rise of streaming services. The symposium welcomes research from a variety of theoretical and methodological perspectives. Potential contributions can include, but are not limited to: • Chapters devoted to a specific platform and corporate context (e.g. Apple TV+, Disney+, HBOMax, etc.) • The convergence of the film and television markets in streaming services • International and intercultural implications of streaming services • Labor and compensation for streaming content production • Changes in network and affiliate relationships for streaming content • Representation and diversity on streaming services • Streaming and reception practices during the COVID pandemic • Streaming services, data generation and analysis
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