92
AdAptAtion in the Age of MediA ConvergenCe
The religious textuality of fandom participation
Even the loose vectors of “centripetal” movement towards or “centrifugal”
movement away from a core text seem untenable under the conditions of
transmedia storytelling. The simple linear model of a triad between media
producers who create media texts and media publishers who distribute
them for the consumption of media users (communicator, message, and
receiver) has long since been replaced by circular models in which values and
meanings are shaped by producers and audiences alike. 18 After Lawrence
Lessig, we know that the Read/Only (RO) culture of old media has been
replaced by the Read/Write (RW) culture of new media. 19 After Henry
Jenkins, we know that participation and collective intelligence are highly
prized in the field of cultural production, but that the relationship between
consumers and producers is often fraught. 20
A classic field analysis à la Bourdieu might argue that high-art authors
write for colleagues and critics while popular authors for the media and
the general public. 21 Hence, a differentiated field analysis would be able
to analyze how franchises produce texts in close negotiation with their
fan communities – supposedly without any media industry interference
that results from the foundational power imbalance between producers
and consumers. As Bourdieu makes clear, cultural capital (which may
result from authorial aloofness) is distinct from economic capital. Indeed,
the less economic profit there is to be gained from cultural production,
the more imperative the engagement between those who offer and those
who still buy becomes. If any textual center still exists, it emerges in the
centrality accorded by interpretative communities through their purses
(economic capital) or their admiration (cultural capital). It is here that the,
admittedly precarious and contested, religious textuality of participatory
culture emerges. Religious textuality clearly implies a centripetal move
towards the canonical core. I take this cue from Benjamin Poore, who
recently pinpointed the friction between convergence and fandom, arguing
about Sherlock Holmes fandom:
18 Cf. Eckart Voigts-Virchow, Introduction to Media Studies (Stuttgart: Klett, 2005), 31, 44.
19 Lawrence Lessig, Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy (London:
Bloomsbury Academic, 2008).
20 Cf. Jenkins, Ford, and Green, where Jenkins updates points made at the time of the millennium
and collected in his Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide (New York: New York
UP, 2006).
21 Cf. Tilman Höss, “Kapital, Feld, Habitus und sozialer Raum: Pierre Bourdieu für Anglisten,”
Zeitschrift für Anglistik und Amerikanistik 55, no. 2 (2007): 187.
AdAptAtion in the Age of MediA ConvergenCe
The religious textuality of fandom participation
Even the loose vectors of “centripetal” movement towards or “centrifugal”
movement away from a core text seem untenable under the conditions of
transmedia storytelling. The simple linear model of a triad between media
producers who create media texts and media publishers who distribute
them for the consumption of media users (communicator, message, and
receiver) has long since been replaced by circular models in which values and
meanings are shaped by producers and audiences alike. 18 After Lawrence
Lessig, we know that the Read/Only (RO) culture of old media has been
replaced by the Read/Write (RW) culture of new media. 19 After Henry
Jenkins, we know that participation and collective intelligence are highly
prized in the field of cultural production, but that the relationship between
consumers and producers is often fraught. 20
A classic field analysis à la Bourdieu might argue that high-art authors
write for colleagues and critics while popular authors for the media and
the general public. 21 Hence, a differentiated field analysis would be able
to analyze how franchises produce texts in close negotiation with their
fan communities – supposedly without any media industry interference
that results from the foundational power imbalance between producers
and consumers. As Bourdieu makes clear, cultural capital (which may
result from authorial aloofness) is distinct from economic capital. Indeed,
the less economic profit there is to be gained from cultural production,
the more imperative the engagement between those who offer and those
who still buy becomes. If any textual center still exists, it emerges in the
centrality accorded by interpretative communities through their purses
(economic capital) or their admiration (cultural capital). It is here that the,
admittedly precarious and contested, religious textuality of participatory
culture emerges. Religious textuality clearly implies a centripetal move
towards the canonical core. I take this cue from Benjamin Poore, who
recently pinpointed the friction between convergence and fandom, arguing
about Sherlock Holmes fandom:
18 Cf. Eckart Voigts-Virchow, Introduction to Media Studies (Stuttgart: Klett, 2005), 31, 44.
19 Lawrence Lessig, Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy (London:
Bloomsbury Academic, 2008).
20 Cf. Jenkins, Ford, and Green, where Jenkins updates points made at the time of the millennium
and collected in his Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide (New York: New York
UP, 2006).
21 Cf. Tilman Höss, “Kapital, Feld, Habitus und sozialer Raum: Pierre Bourdieu für Anglisten,”
Zeitschrift für Anglistik und Amerikanistik 55, no. 2 (2007): 187.