{"title":"Fan-Based citizenship in “Mary Poppins Quits”: fannish affect, public affect, and the potential for solidarity","authors":"Ashley Hinck","doi":"10.1080/15295036.2023.2249082","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT On July 23, 2014, the fiftieth anniversary of Disney’s Mary Poppins, Funny or Die released a video titled, “Mary Poppins Quits with Kristen Bell,” earning more than 4 million views. In the video, Mary Poppins sings to the tune of “A Spoonful of Sugar” while calling for an increase to the federal minimum wage. Understanding fan-based citizenship performances like “Mary Poppins Quits” requires understanding how affect moves between popular culture, fans, and citizens. I argue that Mary Poppins functions as a figure that conducts affect across and between fan-citizens, calling on fans to treat minimum wage workers through the same affective orientation with which they treat Mary Poppins. To make this argument, I draw on work in fan studies and rhetorical studies to define fannish affect and public affect. Turning to my analysis of the “Mary Poppins Quits” video, I argue the video conducts affect through celebrity personae, destabilizes the “worthiness” discourse that often frames minimum wage workers as unworthy of a higher wage, and demands new orientations to one’s fellow citizens. Ultimately, I argue that moving affect from popular culture objects to the public sphere opens up new opportunities for solidarity but carries limitations as well.","PeriodicalId":47123,"journal":{"name":"Critical Studies in Media Communication","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1000,"publicationDate":"2023-08-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Critical Studies in Media Communication","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/15295036.2023.2249082","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
ABSTRACT On July 23, 2014, the fiftieth anniversary of Disney’s Mary Poppins, Funny or Die released a video titled, “Mary Poppins Quits with Kristen Bell,” earning more than 4 million views. In the video, Mary Poppins sings to the tune of “A Spoonful of Sugar” while calling for an increase to the federal minimum wage. Understanding fan-based citizenship performances like “Mary Poppins Quits” requires understanding how affect moves between popular culture, fans, and citizens. I argue that Mary Poppins functions as a figure that conducts affect across and between fan-citizens, calling on fans to treat minimum wage workers through the same affective orientation with which they treat Mary Poppins. To make this argument, I draw on work in fan studies and rhetorical studies to define fannish affect and public affect. Turning to my analysis of the “Mary Poppins Quits” video, I argue the video conducts affect through celebrity personae, destabilizes the “worthiness” discourse that often frames minimum wage workers as unworthy of a higher wage, and demands new orientations to one’s fellow citizens. Ultimately, I argue that moving affect from popular culture objects to the public sphere opens up new opportunities for solidarity but carries limitations as well.
期刊介绍:
Critical Studies in Media Communication (CSMC) is a peer-reviewed publication of the National Communication Association. CSMC publishes original scholarship in mediated and mass communication from a cultural studies and/or critical perspective. It particularly welcomes submissions that enrich debates among various critical traditions, methodological and analytical approaches, and theoretical standpoints. CSMC takes an inclusive view of media and welcomes scholarship on topics such as • media audiences • representations • institutions • digital technologies • social media • gaming • professional practices and ethics • production studies • media history • political economy. CSMC publishes scholarship about media audiences, representations, institutions, technologies, and professional practices. It includes work in history, political economy, critical philosophy, race and feminist theorizing, rhetorical and media criticism, and literary theory. It takes an inclusive view of media, including newspapers, magazines and other forms of print, cable, radio, television, film, and new media technologies such as the Internet.