Available online at www.jmle.org
The National Association for Media Literacy Education’s
Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
Available online at www.jmle.org
Framing the Future of Fanction: How The New York Times’ Portrayal of a
Youth Media Subculture Inuences Beliefs about Media Literacy Educa
tion
Drew Emanuel Berkowitz
Pedagogy and Philosophy, Montclair State University, Montclair, NJ, USA
Abstract
This article discusses how online fanction communities, their members, and their literacy practices are portrayed within popular and
news media discourses. Many media literacy scholars believe these youth media subcultures practice complex and sophisticated forms
of “new media” literacy. However, when educators attempt to incorporate these practices into K-12 literacy programs, the public’s reac-
tions may be heavily inuenced by the media’s documented patterns of marginalizing, dismissing, and denouncing youth subcultures.
This study employs frame and critical discourse analysis in order to examine how the news media’s portrayal of fanction shapes and
reects the beliefs of teachers, students, and parents.
Keywords: fanction, new media literacy, K-12, discourse analysis
Many contemporary youth subcultures
informally practice complex and sophisticated forms
of new media literacy (NML). The members of
“fanction communities,” for example, take characters
and situations from existing television shows, books,
video games, and movies, and actively transform this
material into original ction or artwork (Jenkins 1992;
Mackey and McClay 2008). Several literacy scholars
and practitioners believe that classroom pedagogies
should be changed to reect non-academic, subcultural
practices like fanction (Gee 2004; Gee and Hayes 2010;
Knobel and Lankshear 2007; Lankshear and Knobel
2008; The New London Group 1996). Researchers like
Black (2009), Thomas (2006), Chandler-Olcott and
Mahar (2003) suggest these practices are much more
“meaningful and engaging” than traditional literacies
(Chandler-Olcott and Mahar 2003, 557). However,
when educators attempt to incorporate fanction into
K-12 literacy programs, the public’s reactions may be
heavily inuenced by the media’s documented patterns
of marginalizing, dismissing, and denouncing youth
subcultures (Hall and Jefferson 2006; Hebdige 1979).
Literacy researchers generally regard fanction
(or fan ction) communities as safe spaces for children
to critically explore popular culture texts, social
dynamics, cultural norms, and their own identities
(Black 2009; Chandler-Olcott and Mahar 2003;
Thomas 2007). Yet, many of these scholars also claim
that popular discourse widely dismisses fanction as
non-academic, non-creative, subversive, or extra-legal
(Black 2009; Chandler-Olcott and Mahar 2003; Kell
2009; Stein and Busse 2009). This article examines
how the news media’s portrayal of fanction subculture
affects the public’s expectations and perceptions of
teachers who bring fanction into the classroom.
In a recent issue of the Journal of Media
Literacy Education, Townsend and Ryan (2012, 4(2):
149-58) called for research exploring how media
narratives inuence “what the students in our schools,
their parents, and the politicians and administrators who
mandate public school policy expect of teachers” (156).
Knowledge of educational expectations contributes to
the “context of reception” which guides a teacher’s
decisions about classroom policies and practices (Davis
1997, 154). In order to answer this call for research, my
study examined all articles from a popular news media
outlet, The New York Times, which reported, analyzed,
or discussed the fanction community, its members,
and its practices. I employed a combination of frame
analysis and critical discourse analysis techniques,
designed to identify how The New York Times reects
and inuences socio-cultural beliefs about fanction
and fanction-based literacies. This process addressed
the following research questions:
1. What discourses does The New York Times
employ in its denition of fanction?
2. How is fanction culture characterized by the
discourses?
199
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
3. What discourses does The New York Times
employ in its characterization of fanction
practitioners?
4. What is the purpose and future of fanction
according to the discourses?
Fanction as Subculture
The term fanction describes specic patterns
of textual production and consumption (Hetcher 2009;
Stasi 2006). Fanction authors frequently rely on their
readers’ knowledge of established characters and stories
in order to craft original works of ction (Chandler-
Olcott and Mahar 2003). This source material “offers
a framework of requirements which most fan writers
choose to obey” to varying degrees (Stein and Busse
2009, 195), and fanction communities “dene
themselves around shared readings” of these intertextual
connections (197).
During the 1960s, fans of Star Trek began
exchanging original stories through fan-interest
magazines (“fanzines”) and science ction conventions
(Coppa 2006; Verba 1996). In Japan, amateur manga
artists began circulating dōjinshi, self-published
comic books frequently based on popular anime and
manga stories (Leavitt and Horbinski 2012). Today,
many young fanction practitioners gather in online
communities, formed by common media preferences
rather than demographics such as race, gender, age,
class, or ability (Black 2009; Thomas 2006). These
diverse environments allow participants (especially
“marginalized” adolescents) opportunities to construct
and maintain “thought, identity, and social position”
(Moje 2000, 252) by exercising a range of out-of-school
literacy practices (Chandler-Olcott and Mahar 2003;
Gee 2004).
Many fanction scholars refer to these
communities as “subcultures” (Hadas 2009; Jenkins
1992; Lothian 2011). Henry Jenkins, the father of
contemporary fanction studies (TWC Editor 2008),
based his research on the Centre for Contemporary
Cultural Studies’ “hegemonic” approach to youth
culture. The CCCS’s research dened “subculture” as
the rituals, practices, and styles of those subordinate
groups who are “alternately dismissed, denounced
and canonized; treated at different times as threats
to public order and as harmless buffoons” (Hebdige
1979, 2). This conception of subculture was heavily
inuenced by several twentieth century sociological
theories, including Roland Barthes’ notion of second-
level signication, Antonio Gramsci’s conception
of hegemony as a moving equilibrium, and Claude
Lévi-Strauss’ denition of bricolage as science of the
concrete (Clarke, Hall, Jefferson, and Roberts 2006).
These “hegemonic” researchers envisioned
culture as a complex network of groups and classes,
each competing to disseminate and naturalize their
specic tastes upon the rest of society. Since some
groups have more access to the distribution of ideas
and information (i.e., the mass media), the power to
produce and impose taste upon society is unevenly
distributed between social groups. Several CCCS
researchers examined how the media’s most dominant
discourses and ideologies reected the interests and
taste preferences of society’s most powerful social
classes (CCCS Mugging Group 2006; Clarke 2006b).
For example, Dick Hebdige’s (1979, 2006) case studies
of British punk and mod subcultures demonstrated how
society’s dominant classes used mass media to frame
subcultural styles as deviant, immature, or abnormal.
Jenkins synthesized these cultural theories
with Pierre Bourdieu’s (1979) assertion that “those
who regard themselves as the possessors of legitimate
culture” cannot tolerate alternatives to dominant media
preferences (56-57). His own insider experiences
as a fanction practitioner led him to conclude that
marginalization was deeply engrained in the language
of media discourse. Jenkins (1992) described several
examples of this negative media discourse within non-
ction books, television programs, and lms (12-15).
Jenkins also cited Ien Ang’s (1985) survey of
Dutch viewers of the television program Dallas. Ang
found that respondents who disliked Dallas were far
more comfortable articulating their taste preferences
than respondents who considered themselves “fans.”
She also observed that fans struggled to dene their
appreciation of Dallas as innocent or unproblematic,
while non-fans appealed to widely-circulated, negative
portrayals of Dallas within “mass culture” (104-110).
According to Jenkins, Ang’s study illustrated how me-
dia stereotypes inuence popular discourse, preventing
fans from defending or articulating the merits of their
preferences and practices.
Fanction and Discourse
Many fanction scholars share Jenkins’ view
that fanction practices are marginalized within popular
discourse. Several scholars suggest these prevalent
cultural sentiments complicate attempts to implement
fanction-based classroom literacy practices: according
to a MacArthur Foundation white paper, despite the
200
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
pervasiveness of fanction among youth, “school arts
and creative writing programs remain hostile to overt
signs of repurposed content, emphasizing the ideal of
the autonomous artist” (Jenkins et al. 2006, 33). Since
fanction frequently incorporates narrative and creative
decisions that challenge prevailing cultural notions of
“successful writing,” it is a form of text “privileged
by students but marginalized by teachers” (Chandler-
Olcott and Mahar 2003, 564). These teachers have a
tendency to dismiss their students’ informal learning
experiences as “frivolous” or “leisure-time pursuits
that have little relationship to academic content” (Black
2009, 76, 79).
Stein and Busse (2009) cite their experiences
with “students introduced to fan works in introducto-
ry media studies courses” and a professional author’s
anti-fanction “rant” as evidence that “fan authorship
triggers broader cultural anxieties surrounding threats
to originality and idea ownership in the age of digital
media reproducibility” (205). Angela Thomas (2006)
bases her claim that “writing fan ction in the class-
room was once considered inappropriate (and possibly
still is)” on her own personal experiences in a teacher
education program (229). These scholars use specic
examples of negative discourse to describe “the ways
people (including teachers) have traditionally dismissed
fan ction” (Thomas 2006, 229). Yet, when addressing
or examining these dismissive perceptions, research-
ers have never conducted extensive empirical studies
focusing on the reciprocal relationship between public
and news media discourses.
“The news” is a critical site of popular dis-
course; it produces meanings, symbols, and messages,
which perpetuate and inuence public opinion (Cooper
1989; Fairclough 1995; Fairclough and Wodak 1997;
Schudson 2011). These messages also reect society’s
existing beliefs and values. For example, newspapers
adopt the speech patterns and modes of discourse which
encode their readers’ attitudes, providing ordered and
categorized accounts of events and information which
meet their audiences’ needs (Fowler 1991). By analyz-
ing a typical newspaper’s speech patterns and modes
of discourse, researchers can determine how the news
media represent and inuence cultural beliefs about ed-
ucation (Fairclough 1995; Richardson 2007; Schudson
1995; van Dijk 1997).
News reports are an increasingly inuential
component of the wide array of policy and media dis-
courses that provide a context for beliefs about edu-
cational change (Davis 1997; Thomas 2003; Thomas
2002). This “context of reception” includes a number
of contradictory news media and academic narratives
which “inuence and construct the thoughts and ac-
tions” of policy makers and implementers (Davis 1997,
154). When teachers and administrators craft and im-
plement educational reforms, their contexts of recep-
tion frequently include academic analyses of public
perception; for example, many school districts gravi-
tate towards policies that have the greatest potential for
positive public reception (Stager 2006).
Intertextual linguistic research techniques, such
as critical discourse analysis, show policy-makers and
practitioners how educational reforms are interpreted,
presented to, and received by the public. Discourse
analysis is particularly useful, because it indicates how
“the newspaper medium selects, develops and presents
for public consumption what the discursive themes of
policy will be” (Falk 1994, 11). Despite the benets of
discourse analysis, no reception-based media discourse
analyses appear to have been conducted by fanction
researchers.
Teachers benet from research that examines
the relationship between media narratives and beliefs
about education (Thomas 2002; Townsend and Ryan
2012). Teachers who bring fanction into their class-
rooms will also benet from research that examines the
relationship between media narratives and beliefs about
fanction. This study synthesizes frame and critical
discourse analysis methodologies, in order to examine
how one of the most popular news media outlets, The
New York Times, contributes to these beliefs.
Frame Analysis
According to Normal Fairclough (1995, 1989),
every discursive event involves a text or speech act, the
(re)production or interpretation of this act through dis-
cursive practice, and any socio-cultural practices relat-
ed to such discursive practice. These discursive events
often convey messages and representations concern-
ing cultural identity and relationships. I chose to begin
my examination of The New York Times by identify-
ing its discursive events’ most dominant messages, or
“frames.”
Frames can be determined by analyzing lan-
guage within and across a collection of discursive
events (Menashe and Siegel 1998). Robert Entman
(1993) suggests that frames serve four possible func-
tions: they present or reect culturally prevalent prob-
lem denitions, causal interpretations, moral evalua-
tions, and treatment recommendations. Frame analysis
201
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
can also indicate which parties are considered to be
“causes” of societal problems, and whom society con-
siders to be “experts” on particular topics (Entman
1993; Goffman 1981).
In this study, I employed frame analysis tech-
niques based on the work of Yuqion Zhou and Patricia
Moy (2007), who coded a selection of news reports for
common terms, themes, and passages. Zhou and Moy
sorted each article by its “primary function” (based on
Entman’s four functions of frames) then identied the
frames that each article used to fulll this function. I
made several changes to Zhou and Moy’s method-
ologies; instead of identifying each article’s “primary
function,” I examined how each article fullled each of
Entman’s functions. I also slightly modied Entman’s
categories to t my study: “problem denition” became
“conceptual denition,” “causal” became “purpose,”
“moral” became “legal/moral” to accommodate a more
functional interpretation, and “treatment” became “pre-
scription/prediction.”
This frame analysis provided the foundation for
my subsequent critical discourse analysis. Since critical
discourse analysis examines discourses in or as close as
possible to their original contexts, it is essential to em-
ploy an interpretive lens that preserves the frames’ con-
textual ideology (van Dijk 1997; Wodak 2001). Many
of these frames concerned fanction’s role in shaping
future citizens, and the ability of fanction to fulll so-
ciety’s pedagogical needs. Since none of these articles
questioned whether the needs of society corresponded
to the needs of its citizens, I decided to employ a func-
tionalist sociological lens to process my frame analysis.
The functionalist approach identies how an institution
serves the interests of society and its citizens; unlike
many other sociological lenses, functionalism assumes
these interests are identical (Sadovnik 2007). For ex-
ample, education serves society by conditioning “indi-
viduals to t existing social practices and requirements”
(Feinberg and Soltis 2009, 6). By applying this lens to
my frame analysis, I was able to preserve The New York
Times’ socio-cultural ideology.
Critical Discourse Analysis
While my frame analysis focused on how The
New York Times presents fanction-related topics and
issues (Price and Tewksbury 1997; Scheufele and
Tewksbury 2007), my critical discourse analysis exam-
ined the presence and absence of particular topics and
issues from the narrative. I employed Teun van Dijk’s
model of critical discourse analysis (or CDA), which
focuses on how these patterns of inclusion and exclu-
sion enact and reproduce “social power abuse, domi-
nance, and inequality” between socio-cultural groups
(2003, 338). This conict theoretical approach shows
how “mainstream” news media represent or marginal-
ize fanction subculture by identifying the narrative’s
inconspicuous qualities: orders of discourse, commu-
nicative events, and the strategies and options which
dictate the media’s production of meanings, symbols,
and messages (Fairclough 1995; Jager 2001; van Dijk
1997).
For example, informal rules about what is con-
sidered “newsworthy” govern the news media’s produc-
tion of “reported speech.” When newspapers choose to
report certain events and issues, and not report others,
they create categories of morality for events and infor-
mation. Over time, patterns of inclusion and exclusion
add legitimacy to the public’s views and perspectives
on certain issues. By consistently choosing to frame
certain parties as “experts,” the news media inuence
readers’ views about who speaks with authority on is-
sues like education policy (Fairclough 1995; Fowler
1991; Kress and Van Leeuwen 1998; Schudson 1995).
These media narratives often reinforce inconsistencies
between academic and public conceptions of education
(Rogers et al. 2005; Thomas 2003; Thomas 2002).
The media’s choice of frames is also greatly
inuenced by existing socio-cultural beliefs, creat-
ing reciprocal relationships between media and pub-
lic discourses (Richardson 2007; Rogers et al. 2005).
For instance, society’s gradual shift from production to
consumption culture precipitated similar shifts in me-
dia narratives; these narratives then perpetuated and
reinforced society’s pro-consumption sentiments (Ab-
ercrombie 1991; Fairclough and Wodak 1997, 259).
Van Dijk’s model (1993, 2001, 2006) interprets these
reciprocal relationships in terms of power and domina-
tion. When “mainstream” socio-cultural groups control
news media access, the language of news media acts to
universalize “mainstream” socio-cultural beliefs across
the whole of society (note the similarities between van
Dijk’s theoretical lens and the “hegemonic” lens of
cultural scholars). This study employs van Dijk’s ap-
proach to investigate whether the media’s portrayal of
fanction reects, perpetuates, or reinforces any exist-
ing socio-cultural patterns of marginalization.
Data Selection
My data set consisted of articles published in
The New York Times between 1969 (the year the Star
202
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
Trek fan community rst produced fanction in its con-
temporary form) and 2011 (Hellekson and Busse 2006).
I conducted three searches (“internet” + “student” +
“enthusiasm,” “fan ction” or “fanction” or “remix
culture,” and “fanzine”) which generated an initial set
of six hundred and twenty-ve articles. I immediately
realized that my search criteria had “cast too wide a
net,” resulting in many articles that were unrelated to
my study.
One hundred and seventy-eight of the one hun-
dred and eighty-eight articles produced by my search
for “fanzine” (a medium commonly used by pre-inter-
net fan and fanction communities (Ebert 2005)) re-
ferred to an alternate, non-applicable denition of the
term (product mailings put out by industries for the ben-
et of consumers). My search for “internet” + “student”
+ “enthusiasm” also resulted in a staggering amount of
articles which were wholly unrelated to education or
online fan activity. After removing a number of other
articles, including obituaries of fanction practitioners
and articles that contained a single mention of fan activ-
ity without explanation for unfamiliar readers, I arrived
at a nal data set of fty articles.
Although my initial data set extended back to the
1960s, my nal data set’s earliest article is a 1986 piece
by Camille Bacon-Smith (who later became a promi-
nent scholar of fanction). Most articles were published
in the 2000s, with a low incidence of author repetition.
Twenty-nine authors published only a single article, and
ve authors published two articles. This suggests that
The New York Times’ narrative of fanction represents
a healthy variety of author voices, rather than a large
quantity of articles penned by a small group of editors
or experts on staff.
Frame Analysis Findings
After I determined which articles were suit-
able for inclusion, I coded each article’s key terms and
themes. I then analyzed these codes, determining how
each article might fulll each frame function category.
For example, I examined Julie Salamon’s (2001) “Teen-
age Viewers Declare Independence: When it Comes to
TV, Coveted Adolescents Prove to be Unpredictable,”
and asked how the article answered each of my four
research questions.
Salamon describes Lily Rothman, a teenage fan
of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. After every episode, Lily
“gets on the phone or the Internet to analyze the episode
with other fans” (2001, 1). Lily creates fanction in an
online community, which Salamon characterizes as an
extension of youth culture. Salamon’s article discusses
how Lily and other teenage members of the fanction
community share their experiences and interests. In
Lily’s own words: “[I have] so much in common with
the people I meet through ‘Buffy’... I can’t pinpoint
why, exactly, but we tend to like the same music and
the same books and the same movies” (1).
Salaman uses the story of Lily to frame fanc-
tion as a creative, identity-producing activity for teen-
agers (conceptual denition frame). Salamon uses the
“participatory” and “interest sharing” purpose frames
to describe Lily’s desire to participate in a community
that shares her own interests; these frames are contained
within quotes from Henry Jenkins, who is presented
as an expert on fanction. Salamon also employs the
“self-branding” purpose frame, describing how teenag-
ers make a television show “part of their identity” by
writing fanction (2001, 1). She employs the “adoles-
cent” evaluative frame to describe Lily’s behavior as
typical for her age. Salamon refers to this behavior as
“unpredictable” (1) and repeatedly mentions that tele-
vision executives seek to understand and control it (im-
plying the “co-opted” prediction frame).
After completing my frame analysis, I grouped
frames that were ideologically linked through similari-
ty or opposition (for example, “extends life” was linked
with “extension of show,” and “youth” was linked with
“adult”). Appendix 1 illustrates this frame distribution.
Conceptual Denition Frames - What Is Fanction,
How Do the Media Depict It, and What Language is
Used in This Denition?
The New York Times almost always dened fan-
ction by its subject, and almost always framed the sub-
ject of fanction as “existing/favorite characters.” Most
articles portrayed fanction as additional, if unofcial,
extensions to existing intellectual properties. Fanction
offers new stories and alternate plots that ll in the gaps
between ofcial ction or extend the life of cancelled
franchises (Bazelon 2007; Kakutani 2010; Kirkpatrick
2002; O’Connell 2000).
These articles framed fanction writing as artis-
tic, creative, and active, at least when compared to “tra-
ditional” forms of media consumption. However, even
the most pro-fanction articles drew sharp distinctions
between the professional works of media creators and
the unprofessional “reshaping of a creator’s product
by the user” (Leland 2002, 1). For instance, Harmon
(1997) described fanction as creative “scribbling” (1)
while Mirapaul (2001) referred to “amateur” media cre-
203
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
ated by “impatient” fans (2). These frames ensure “fan”
remains inseparable from “fanction” in news media
discourse.
Purpose Frames - How Did Fanction Come into Be-
ing, Why Does It Exist, and What Purpose Does it
Serve?
Many science ction and fantasy fans feel frus-
trated by their passive role in traditional media culture.
Fanction communities coalesce around the common
desires of media fans to enter into a more participa-
tory interaction with their favorite characters and sto-
ries (Heffernan 2008; Kakutani 2010; Walker 2008).
Articles by O’Connell (2000), Mirapaul (2001), and
Kakutani (2010) describe how this desire to inuence
and engage with media results in a “vast body of shared
commentary and speculation that often seems to over-
shadow” discussion of the original media (Kakutani
2010, 1). Members of fanction communities share far
more than their stories; they share intimate references,
context-specic knowledge, and inside jokes about
their favorite media (Heffernan 2007; Scott 2002).
Several articles positively depicted fanction as
a diversionary, enjoyable recreational activity (Powers
2000; Wortham 2010). Fanction was also described
as a tool for correcting ctional injustices perpetrated
by the source materials’ authors. For example, a doctor
accused of criminal negligence on an episode of Chi-
cago Hope had been exonerated within the narratives of
many Chicago Hope fanction communities (Business/
Financial Desk 1997).
Legal/Moral Evaluative Frames - How Is the Legal
and Moral Status of Fanction Depicted by the Ar-
ticles, What Language is Used to Describe Fanction
Authors, and What Judgments Are Made about Practi-
tioners and Their Subculture?
Many articles described fanction authors as
dedicated (Nussbaum 2003), but the specic language
used to frame their “zealous” (Stelter 2008, 5) or “mar-
ginal obsessive” (Manly 2006, 1) behavior varied. The
normalcy of fanction appeared largely dependent on
the fan’s age. Adult fanction authors were portrayed
as perverts playing out their media-inspired sexual
fantasies (McGrath 1998; O’Connell 2005; Orr 2004),
whereas children and adolescents used fanction as a
creative form of literacy and self-expression (Aspan
2007; Kirkpatrick 2002; Salamon 2001).
Almost every article that mentioned the legality
of fanction always did so from a cautionary perspec-
tive, arguing that allowing fans to produce fanction
and fan lms was free publicity and always within a
copyright holder’s best interests. Clive Thompson
(2005) suggested that the popular Halo fan-lm Red
vs. Blue contributed to the Halo brand by granting the
video game “a whiff of counterculture coolness, the sort
of grass-roots street cred that major corporations des-
perately crave but can never manufacture” (21). Arti-
cles frequently condemned intellectual property holders
who chose to assert their rights as “going after their own
consumers,” suggesting it was far better for companies
to work with their fans than against them (Walker 2006,
22).
Prescription/Prediction Frames - What Should Be Done
about Fanction, What Is Going to Happen to Fanc-
tion in the Future, and What Is Going to Be the Re-
lationship between Fanction, Copyright Holders, and
Educators?
The New York Times generally presented fanc-
tion as a nancial opportunity for the corporations that
own the intellectual properties copied by fanction.
Many articles asserted that franchises benet from, and
in some cases rely on, their fanction communities. For
example, Harris (2008) ties the box ofce success of
the X-Files lm to the continued health of its fanction
community, while Heffernan (2008) depicts a lack of
homoerotic fanction as problematic for the success of
any show with a large, attractive male cast. Thompson
(2005) reports on the lucrative partnership between the
Halo fan-lm circle Rooster Teeth and Halo’s copy-
right holder Microsoft. This “co-opted/encouraged by
industry” frame presents a view of fanction’s future as
a marketing tool, rather than a fan-driven culture. The
frame is frequently associated with the “self-branding”
purpose frame; teenagers who desire to become part of
their favored franchise show their solidarity with the
product and fan subculture in ways which are extremely
benecial for intellectual property holders (Hitt 2008;
Scott 2002).
Several other articles described the educational
potential of fanction. Emily Bazelon (2007) reported
on the use of fanction writing as creative therapy for
autistic teenage girls, James Warren (2011) described
how Chicago public libraries employed fanction in
extracurricular literacy programs, and Mokoto Rich
(2009) presented a report on ction reading statistics,
referring to fanction as virtually indistinguishable
from print ction in evaluating literacy rates and child-
hood reading frequencies. Each of these frames advo-
204
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
cated for the increased use of fanction in educational
settings. For example, Rich (2009) cited fanction’s use
by parents as an alternative to television for their chil-
dren’s entertainment: in one parent’s own words: “I’m
just pleased she reads something anymore” (1).
Functionalist Interpretation of Frames
From a functionalist perspective, fanction
communities benet society in two ways: they offer
marginalized, youth-safe, creative outlets for expression
and participation; and they instill the value of reading,
creative writing, and peer critical interaction in youth
populations.
The New York Times frames fanction writing
as a healthy and culturally monolithic teenage activity,
practiced by traditionally marginalized science ction
and fantasy “geeks” (Bazelon 2007; Scott 2002). Recall
how Salamon (2001) employed “participation,” “iden-
tity construction,” and “interest sharing” frames to de-
pict Lily Rothman’s interest in writing Buffy fanction.
Lily’s fanction practices are motivated by a desire to
participate with like-minded Buffy fans, so she uploads
her work to an online fanction community.
Since a large portion of fanction writing is
“romantic,” fanction communities are particularly ap-
pealing to female fans of science ction and fantasy
who typically lack a critical voice, peer interaction, or
sense of validation within other, more male-oriented fan
subcultures (Business/Financial Desk 1997; O’Connell
2000). Fanction provides girls like Lily with a chance
to express themselves, by modifying genres and stories
that have “all but excluded” their perspectives (Bacon-
Smith 1986, 2).
The New York Times validates the literary merit
of fanction writing. Articles assure parents that their
children’s dwindling literacies are simply being re-
placed by equally viable alternatives: their children are
not reading and writing less, they are simply reading and
writing differently. Fanction is framed as a healthy lit-
eracy practice, employed by local kids in public librar-
ies (Aspan 2007; Warren 2011). For example, Salamon
claims that Lily’s media consumption and production
practices “reect her generation in many ways” (2001,
1). Overall, this functional interpretation reects a posi-
tive, non-marginalizing view of fanction as practiced
by technologically savvy teenagers.
Critical Discourse Analysis Findings
If “marginalization” only concerns negative por-
trayals of social groups, then The New York Times does
not marginalize youth fanction subcultures. However,
cultural research indicates that the mainstream media
can dominate youth subcultures in a variety of ways,
including: the incorporation of subcultural aspects back
into dominant culture (Hall 1977); the conversion and
re-appropriation of subcultural signs, effectively reduc-
ing them to commodities (Hebdige 2006); marketing
products or services to specic subcultures, to exploit
group afliation for prot (Clarke 2006a); labeling or
redening subcultural groups and practices as deviant
or leisure pursuits (Hebdige 1979); converting the mem-
bers of subculture back into dominant culture (Geertz
1964); pathologizing subculture (Clarke 2006b); and
pitting subcultures against one another for resources
(Murdock 1974). By applying Teun van Dijk’s power
and domination-centered CDA approach to the data, I
was able to identify several of these media responses
(most notably labeling and marketing) within the nar-
rative. These patterns of subcultural disempowerment
revealed a deeply troubling account of the future of fan-
ction as an autonomous creative practice.
The most common frame identied by my study
was “interest sharing”; out of fty articles, thirty-two
described fanction subculture as a community where
fans meet to create and discuss shared cultural experi-
ences. Out of these thirty-two articles, none included
any meaningful discussion of how these shared cul-
tural experiences are determined by commercial me-
dia exposure, evaluated by “devotion” to commercial
media, or solidied through additional media interests
that many fans suspiciously seem to share. Recall once
again Lily Rothman, who had “so much in common
with the people I meet through ‘Buffy,’” but couldn’t
determine why (Salamon 2001, 1). Salamon mentions
that Lily and her peers liked “the same music and the
same books and the same movies,” but does not ques-
tion why all of these “common interests” involve media
consumption (1).
According to childhood consumer culture schol-
ars, these “common interests” are generated and manip-
ulated by corporations, who take advantage of global-
ization and digital distribution to create an increasingly
diverse range of branded media franchises (Prout 2005;
Sekeres 2009). When communities of “fans” form
around particularly viable franchises, companies create
(and heavily market) new products designed to capi-
talize on “self-branding” behavior. For example, Twi-
light’s tale of characters with secret supernatural pow-
ers living incognito in the present-day world closely
resembled Harry Potter’s core premise, and was heav-
205
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
ily marketed towards self-described Harry Potter fans
(Sekeres 2009, 403). This marketing extends beyond
the connes of the brand to related media; by select-
ing a moody Radiohead song as the climactic ending
theme to the Twilight lm, producers introduced young,
moody Twilight fans to a perhaps unfamiliar band. One
wonders whether members of Twilight fanction com-
munities now “mysteriously” share an appreciation for
Radiohead.
Many articles frame fanction as yet another
aspect of these media brands. As Stuart Elliot (2005)
notes: “[I]f you like the TV show, why not buy the fra-
grance? Wear the jewelry? Read the book? Join other
fans online to help write an episode?” (7). Due to corpo-
rations “co-opting” and “encouraging” fanction, par-
ticipants in fanction communities have become “brand
ambassadors” (Elliott 2005, 7), similar to the walking
billboards of brand name clothing and logo-as-fashion
(Stelter 2008).
Throughout these narratives, media executives
and market researchers are consistently privileged as
authoritative voices on the future of education, as well
as primary stakeholders in the future of fanction com-
munities (Bosman 2010; Harris 2008; Stelter 2008).
Most articles frame excited fans as those who welcome
the chance to participate in “ofcial” fanction; far few-
er articles discuss whether these partnerships will cause
fanction communities to lose their creative autonomy
and become inseparable components of the brands they
once sought to emulate (Hitt 2008). Corporations no
longer need to sue fanction communities; rather than
being litigated into submission, authors now give up
their rights willingly.
Although Salamon’s (2001) article is not the
strongest example of marginalization within the data
set, or even the most detailed description of the fan c-
tion community, her depiction of Lily illustrates The
New York Times’ overall portrayal of adolescent fanc-
tion practitioners. Salamon uses Lily as a market re-
search “survey sample of one”: a “coveted adolescent”
with “ercely loyal, opinionated, even obsessive, but
also unpredictable” patterns of media consumption (1).
Corporations are framed as stakeholders by Salamon;
she cites market research that describes how teenagers
like Lily “spend a lot of money” (1), but excludes any
frames that concern the morality of industries that capi-
talize on the excessive consumption of Lily’s genera-
tion. When all is said and done, the only “disturbing fact
of life” is that television executives cannot predict what
Lily is going to watch or buy next (Salamon 2001, 1).
Implications
This study provides little evidence that the news
media bias parents and administrators against the use of
fanction in the K-12 classroom. Throughout the nar-
rative, fanction is depicted as an increasingly normal
(Bazelon 2007), “mainstream” youth practice (Manly
2006, 1). These frames reduce the subversive nature of
fanction subculture by equating it to other, safe com-
mercial hobbies (this is extremely similar to society’s
response to punk subculture; for an example, see Heb-
dige 1979, or visit any “Hot Topic” retail store).
The New York Times uses glowingly positive
language to describe the educational benets of fan-
ction. For example, Warren (2011) refers to Chicago
Mayor Richard Daley’s publicly funded “YOUme-
dia” fanction writing program as part of the Mayor’s
“impressive legacy when it comes to culture and lit-
eracy” (27A). Other articles assert that fanction rep-
resents a new paradigm in literacy and learning (Rich
2009, 2008). These frames suggest that teachers need
not “wonder how an average parent might respond”
to classroom practices based on youth media litera-
cies (Hobbs 1998, 21). However, before teachers adopt
these literacy practices, they should rst consider “what
is being taught” and learned by the members of youth
subcultures (Gee and Hayes 2010, 186).
Although many teachers believe that fanction
communities offer non-commercial tools for critically
understanding media, The New York Times portrays
fanction as an extension of branded children’s media.
Educators should acknowledge the most frightening
implication of this frame: that fanction communities
are becoming sites “of cultural hegemony in which
people are socialized into dominant values (of capital-
ism, for instance)” (Gee and Hayes 2010, 186). Every
literacy practitioner must question whether these values
belong in the K-12 classroom, and whether The New
York Times’ depictions of commodied fanction are
compatible with the basic tenets of multi-literacy peda-
gogy.
For years, fanction has been a predominantly
non-commercial activity (Hellekson 2009). Recently,
scholars like Scott (2009), Pearson (2010), and Noppe
(2011) have suggested that fanction communities
should embrace consumerism in order to “ensure that
commodication of fan work ends up benetting fans
rst” (Noppe 2011, 1.4). For example, Noppe (2011)
discusses how integrating “fan work into the broader
cultural economy could be both socially and economi-
206
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
cally desirable,” drawing comparisons between Ameri-
can fanction communities and Japan’s commodied
dōjinshi subcultures (7.1). Noppe (2011) also calls for
further research investigating whether corporations
will “seize the initiative toward commodication at the
expense of fans” (5.1). Unfortunately, The New York
Times implies that commodication will disproportion-
ately benet these corporations, resulting in the reduced
creative autonomy and increased societal marginaliza-
tion of fanction subcultures. Based on these ndings,
I suggest that fanction communities should safeguard
themselves from external commodifying pressures, in
order to preserve their successful gift economies.
Conclusion
Since The New York Times does not negatively
frame fanction literacy practices, why do so many fan-
ction scholars and practitioners report that negative
discourses about fanction hinder classroom literacy
initiatives? One possible explanation is that fanction
scholars have relied too heavily on isolated examples of
negative discourses, and have not considered the overall
ratio of these negative discourses to positive discours-
es. For example, Jenkins (1992) refers to several lms,
television shows, and non-ction books that negatively
depict fans, but Jenkins never provides the size of his
entire data set or information about positive depictions.
Since Jenkins only presents eleven lms in his ndings,
and does not provide his data collection methodologies,
it is difcult to determine the implications or transfer-
ability of Jenkins’ study. A parent might view fans nega-
tively if they were to watch all eleven of these lms,
but what if they were to watch eleven random lms that
depicted fans?
Based on inconsistencies between this study and
other fanction research, I recommend that other fan-
ction scholars attempt to reproduce these ndings by
analyzing the discourses of other news media outlets.
The New York Times represents just one particular cross-
section of news media discourse. Since newspapers re-
ect the language and ideology of their target audiences
(Fowler 1991), educators should investigate whether
teachers and parents in their districts are consumers of
The New York Times or ideologically similar media. Lo-
cal newspapers, cable news television, and social media
aggregation websites might each convey distinct messag-
es about fanction. Each contains an as-yet-unexplored
set of discourses, which certainly merit future analysis.
The New York Times describes fanction as a
normal adolescent activity, and a powerful tool for me-
dia literacy education. It also frames fanction commu-
nities as nancially lucrative extensions of children’s
branded media culture. By critically examining a col-
lection of The New York Times’ discursive events, this
study has shown how news media portrayals of fanc-
tion are situated within broader cultural contexts, re-
vealing a positive, if ultimately troubling, account of
fanction and fanction-based literacy practices.
207
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
Appendix 1: Frequency of Dominant Frames
Conceptual Denition
Frames (how is FF
dened?)
Purpose Frames (why
does FF exist?)
Legal/Moral
Evaluative Frames (how
are authors and
practices depicted?)
Prescription/
Prediction Frames (what
should be done/is the
future of FF?)
Existing/favorite
characters
24
Interest sharing
32
Dedicated/obsessive/
unhealthy/
devoted/normal
19
Co-opted/encouraged by
industry
19
Extends life/extension of
show/supplement
14
Participatory
22
Adolescent/youth/age
vs. Raunchy/adult/erotic
(sex)
9
Gains own fans/becomes
genre/replaces source
material
7
Non-passive (fandom)
12
Art creation
15
Illegality/subversive
6
Embraced by teachers/
parents/
as a tool of therapy
7
Creative/original/
non-formulaic
12
Self-branding/tribute
9
Embarrassing/worthless/
no appeal
3
Becomes legitimate/
mainstream
6
Scribbling/
unprofessional/amateur/
non-creative/marginal
9
Protest/criticism/
correcting injustice
6
Empowering/gender
enabling
3
Discouraged
3
Artistic community/form
of expression
3
Self-amusing
4
Private
2
Grassroots/becomes
organized
3
Literacy
3
Bridge to legitimacy
2
Kids/Youth/Accessible
3
Political expression/
experimental art
2
Users
2
208
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
Bosman, J.
Corrections
Hale, M.
Heffernan, V.
Heffernan, V.
Jurgensen, J.
Kennedy, R.
Kennedy, R.
Kowinski, W. S.
Lee, L.
Letter to the Editor
Nussbaum, E.
O’Connell, P. L.
O’Connell, P. L.
Pogrebin, R.
Ryzik, M.
Schussler, J.
Taylor, C.
A New Writer Is Soaring On the Wings of a Dragon
Comment on May 5th article
In “Lost,” Mythology Trumps Mystery
Sepia No More
Critic’s Notebook: Santa Before His Beard and Some Bad-Boy Cheer
Rewriting the Rules of Fiction
Poster Boy Is Caught, Or is it a Stand-In?
With Irreverence and an iPod, Recreating the Museum Tour
A Salute to James Doohan, Who Beamed People Up as Scotty
Film: Up and Coming - Hayden Christensen: Life as the Latest Bearer of
the Force
“The Flying Nun”: My Mary Sue
A DVD Face-Off: The Ofcial vs. the Homemade
Online Diary: New Realm for Rowling
Online Diary: Start Your Broomsticks
This Week Ahead Feb 13-Feb 19
Spare Times: Previously on Lost
I Was a Regency Zombie
Baker Street Regular
Appendix 2: List of Unreferenced Artifacts from the Data Set
This data set is entirely composed of print news artifacts taken from The New York Times and its supplements
(ex. The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Book Review).
Oct 11, 2006
May 12, 2002
May 21, 2010
Apr 27, 2008
Dec 24, 2003
Sep 16, 2006
Feb 4, 2009
May 28, 2005
Aug 31, 2004
Oct 21, 2001
Nov 2, 2003
Dec 21, 2003
Jun 17, 2004
Jun 19, 2003
Feb 13, 2011
May 30, 2008
Feb 22, 2009
Nov 12, 2006
Author Date Title
209
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
References
Abercrombie, Nicholas. 1991. “The Privilege of the
Producer.” In Enterprise Culture, edited by Rus-
sell Keat and Nicholas Abercrombie, 175-185.
London: Routledge.
Ang, Ien. 1985. Watching Dallas: Soap Opera and the
Melodramatic Imagination. London: Methuen.
Aspan, Maria. 2007. “Potter Fans are on Board, Eagerly
Awaiting the Finale.” The New York Times, June
17, 14NJ.12.
Bacon-Smith, Camille. 1986. “Spock among the Wo-
men.” The New York Times, November 16, A.1.
Bazelon, Emily. 2007. “What Are Autistic Girls Made
Of?” The New York Times Magazine, August 05,
38-43.
Black, Rebecca W. 2009. “Online Fan Fiction and Crit-
ical Media Literacy.” Journal of Computing in
Teacher Education 26(2): 75-80.
Bosman, Julie. 2010. “Booksellers Brace for ‘Mock-
ingjay’ Landing.” The New York Times, August 24,
C.1.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1979. Distinction: A Social Cri-
tique of the Judgment of Taste. Cambridge: Har-
vard.
Business/Financial Desk. 1997. “Business Digest.” The
New York Times, August 18, D.1.
CCCS Mugging Group. 2006. “Some Notes on the Re-
lationship between the Societal Control Culture
and the News Media, and the Construction of a
Law and Order Campaign.” In Resistance through
Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Post-War Britain
(Second edition), edited by Stuart Hall and Tony
Jefferson, 58-62. New York: Routledge.
Chandler-Olcott, Kelly, and Donna Mahar. 2003. “Ad-
olescents’ Anime-Inspired Fanctions: An Explo-
ration of Multiliteracies.” Journal of Adolescent
and Adult Literacy 46(7): 556–566.
Clarke, John. 2006a. “The Skinheads and the Magical
Recovery of Community.” In Resistance through
Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Post-War Britain
(Second edition), edited by Stuart Hall and Tony
Jefferson, 78-81. New York: Routledge.
———. 2006b. “Style.” In Resistance through Rituals:
Youth Subcultures in Post-War Britain (Second
edition), edited by Stuart Hall and Tony Jefferson,
145-159. New York: Routledge.
Clarke, John, Stuart Hall, Tony Jefferson, and Brian
Roberts. 2006. “Subcultures, Cultures and Class.”
In Resistance through Rituals: Youth Subcultures in
Post-War Britain (Second edition), edited by
Stuart Hall and Tony Jefferson, 1-57. New York:
Routledge.
Cooper, Martha. 1989. Analyzing Public Discourse.
Prospect Heights: Waveland Press.
Coppa, Francesca. 2006. “A Brief History of Media
Fandom.” In Fan Fiction and Fan Communities in
the Age of the Internet, edited by Karen Hellekson
and Kristina Busse, 41-59. Jefferson: McFarland
& Co.
Davis, James N. 1997. “Educational Reform and the
Babel (Babble) of Culture: Prospects for the Stan-
dards for Foreign Language Learning.” The Mod-
ern Language Journal 81(11): 151-163.
Ebert, Roger. “Thought Experiments: How Propeller-
Heads, BNFs, Sercon Geeks, Newbies, Recovering
GAFIAtors, and Kids in the Basements Invented
the World Wide Web, All Except for the Delivery
System.” Asimov’s Science Fiction, January 2005,
12-17.
Elliott, Stuart. 2005. “Like the Show? Buy the Book.
And the Earrings. And the…” The New York Times,
December 01, C.7.
Entman, Robert. 1993. “Framing: Toward Clarication
of a Fractured Paradigm.” Journal of Communica-
tion 43(4): 51-58.
Fairclough, Norman. 1995. Critical Discourse Analysis:
The Critical Study of Language. New York: Long-
man.
———. 1989. Language and Power. London: Long-
man.
Fairclough, Norman, and Ruth Wodak. 1997. “Critical
Discourse Analysis.” In Discourse as Social Inter-
action, edited by Teun A. van Dijk, 258-284. Lon-
don: SAGE.
Falk, Ian. 1994. “The Making of Policy: Media Dis-
course Conversations.” Discourse: Studies in the
Cultural Politics of Education 15(2), 1-12.
Feinberg, Walter, and Jonas Soltis. 2009. School and So-
ciety, Fifth Edition. New York: Teachers College
Press.
Fowler, Roger. 1991. Language in the News: Discourse
and Ideology in the Press. New York: Routledge.
Gee, James Paul. 2004. Situated Language and Learn-
ing: A Critique of Traditional Schooling. New
York: Routledge.
Gee, James Paul, and Elisabeth Hayes. 2010. “Pub-
lic Pedagogy through Video Games: Design, Re-
sources & Afnity Spaces.” In Handbook of Pub-
lic Pedagogy: Education and Learning Beyond
210
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
Schooling, edited by Jennifer A. Sandlin, Brian D.
Schultz, and Jake Burdick, 185-193. New York:
Routledge.
Geertz, Clifford. 1964. “Ideology as a Cultural System.”
In Ideology and Discontent, edited by David E.
Apter, 47-76. New York: Free Press.
Goffman, Erving. 1981. “A Reply to Denzin and Keller.”
Contemporary Sociology 10(1): 60–68.
Hadas, Leora. 2009. “The Web Planet: How the Chang-
ing Internet Divided ‘Doctor Who’ Fan Fiction
Writers.” Transformative Works and Cultures 3.
doi:10.3983/twc.2009.0129.
Hall, Stuart. 1977. “Culture, the Media and the ‘Ideolog-
ical Effect.’” In Mass Communication and Society,
edited by James Curran, Michael Gurevitch, and
Janet Woolacott, 315-348. London: Edward Ar-
nold.
Hall, Stuart, and Tony Jefferson. 2006. “Once More
around Resistance through Rituals.” In Resistance
through Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Post-War
Britain (Second edition), edited by Stuart Hall and
Tony Jefferson, viii-xxxiii. New York: Routledge.
Harmon, Amy. 1997. “In TV’s Dull Summer Days, Plots
Take Wing on the Net.” The New York Times, Au-
gust 18, A-1.
Harris, Mark. 2008. “Still out There (in Movie Thea-
ters).” The New York Times, July 13, AR.1.
Hebdige, Dick. 2006. “The Meaning of Mod.” In Resis-
tance through Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Post-
War Britain (Second edition), edited by Stuart Hall
and Tony Jefferson, 69-77. New York: Routledge.
———. 1979. Subculture: The Meaning of Style. Lon-
don: Methuen.
Heffernan, Virginia. 2008. “Art in the Age of Franchis-
ing.” The New York Times Magazine, January 20,
21-22.
———. 2007. “End-of-Days Fidelity for ‘Jericho.’”
The New York Times, May 30, E.1.
Hellekson, Karen. 2009. “A Fannish Field of Value:
Online Fan Gift Culture.” Cinema Journal 48(4):
113-118.
Hellekson, Karen and Kristina Busse. 2006. Fan
Fiction and Fan Communities in the Age of the In-
ternet: New Essays. Jefferson: McFarland & Co.
Hetcher, Steven A. 2009. “Using Social Norms to Reg-
ulate Fan Fiction and Remix Culture.” University
of Pennsylvania Law Review 157(6): 1869-1935.
Hitt, Jack. 2008. “Multiscreen Mad Men.” The New
York Times Magazine, November 23, 64-69.
Hobbs, Renee. 1998. “The Seven Great Debates in the Me-
dia Literacy Movement.” Journal of Communica-
tion 48:16-32.
Jager, Siegfried. 2001. “Discourse and Knowledge:
Theoretical and Methodological Aspects of a Criti-
cal Discourse and Dispositive Analysis.” In Meth-
ods of Critical Discourse Analysis, edited by Ruth
Wodak and Michael Meyer, 32-62. London: SAGE.
Jenkins, Henry, Katie Clinton, Ravi Purushotma, Alice
J. Robison, and Margaret Weigel. 2006. Confront-
ing the Challengers of Participatory Culture: Me-
dia Education for the 21st Century. Illinois: The
MacArthur Foundation.
Jenkins, Henry. 1992. Textual Poachers: Television Fans
and Participatory Culture. New York: Routledge.
Kakutani, Michiko. 2010. “Texts without Con-
text.” The New York Times, March 21, AR.1.
Kell, Tracey. 2009. “Using Fan Fiction to Teach Critical
Reading and Writing Skills.” Teacher Librarian
37(1): 32-35.
Kirkpatrick, David D. 2002. “Harry Potter and the Quest
for the Unnished Volume.” The New York Times,
May 05, 1.1.
Knobel, Michele, and Colin Lankshear. 2007. A
New Literacies Sampler. New York: Peter Lang.
Kress, Gunther and Theo Van Leeuwen. 1998. “Front
Pages: (The Critical) Analysis of Newspaper Lay-
out.” In Approaches to Media Discourse, edited
by Allan Bell and Peter Garrett, 186-219. Malden:
Blackwell.
Lankshear, Colin, and Michele Knobel. 2008.
Digital Literacies (New Literacies and Digital
Epistemologies). New York: Peter Lang.
Leavitt, Alex, and Andrea Horbinski. 2012. “Even
a Monkey Can Understand Fan Activism: Po-
litical Speech, Artistic Expression, and a Pub-
lic for the Japanese Dôjin Community.” Trans-
formative Works and Cultures 10. doi:10.3983/
twc.2012.0321.
Leland, John. 2002. “The Myth of the Offenseless
Society.” The New York Times, June 09, 4.1.
Lothian, Alexis. 2011. “An Archive of One’s Own: Sub-
cultural Creativity and the Politics of Conser-
vation.” Transformative Works and Cultures 6.
doi:10.3983/twc.2011.0267.
Mackey, Margaret, and Jill McClay. 2008. “Pirates and
Poachers: Fan Fiction and the Conventions of
Reading and Writing.” English in Education 42(2):
131-147.
Manly, Lorne. 2006. “Your TV Would Like a Word with
You.” The New York Times, November 19, 2.1.
211
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
McGrath, Charles. 1998. “It Just Looks Paranoid.” The
New York Times Magazine, June 14, 56-56.
Menashe, Claudia L., and Michael Siegel. 1998.
“The Power of a Frame: An Analysis of Newspa-
per Coverage of Tobacco Issues – United States,
1985-1996.” Journal of Health Communication 3:
307-325.
Mirapaul, Matthew. 2001. “Why Just Listen to Pop When
You Can Mix Your Own?” The New York Times,
August 20, E.2.
Moje, Elizabeth. 2000. “‘To Be Part of the Story’:
The Literacy Practices of Gangsta Adolescents.”
Teachers College Record 102(3): 651-690.
Murdock, Graham. 1974. “Mass Communications and
the Construction of Meaning.” In Reconstructing
Social Psychology, edited by Nigel Armistead, 205-
220. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.
New London Group, The. 1996. “A Pedagogy of Mul-
tiliteracies: Designing Social Futures.” Harvard
Educational Review 66(1): 60-92.
Noppe, Nele. 2011. “Why We Should Talk about Com-
modifying Fan Work.” Transformative Works and
Cultures 8. doi:10.3983/twc.2011.0369.
Nussbaum, Emily. 2003. “Sick of ‘Buffy’ Cultists? You
Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet.” The New York Times,
June 08, 2.24.
O’Connell, Pamela L. 2000. “A World without End for
Fans of Jane Austen.” The New York Times. January
13. C.8.
———. 2005. “Please Don’t Call It a G-Rated Dispute.”
The New York Times. April 18. G.10.
Orr, David. 2004. “The Widening Web of Digital Lit.”
The New York Times Book Review, October 03,
7.26.
Pearson, Roberta. 2010. “Fandom in the Digital Era.”
Popular Communication 8(1): 84-95.
Powers, Ann. 2000. “Fans Go Interactive, and Popular
Culture Feels the Tremors.” The New York Times,
September 20, H.25.
Price, Vincent, and David Tewksbury. 1997. “News
Values and Public Opinion: A Theoretical Account
of Media Priming and Framing.” In Progress and
Communication Sciences: Advances in Persuasion
(vol. 13), edited by Franklin J. Boster and George
Barnett, 173-212. Greenwich: Ablex.
Prout, Alan. 2005. The Future of Childhood: Towards the
Interdisciplinary Study of Children. New York:
Routledge Falmer.
Rich, Motoko. 2009. “Fiction Reading Increases for
Adults.” The New York Times, January 12, C.1.
———. 2008. “Literacy Debate: Online, R U Really
Reading?” The New York Times, July 27, A.1.
Richardson, John E. 2007. Analysing Newspapers: An
Approach from Critical Discourse Analysis. Chip-
penham: Palgrave Macmillan.
Rogers, Rebecca, Elizabeth Melancharuvil-
Berkes, Melissa Mosley, Diane Hui, and Glynis
O’Garro Joseph. 2005. “Critical Discourse Analy-
sis in Education: A Review of the Literature.” Re-
view of Educational Research 75(3): 365-416.
Sadovnik, Alan R. 2007. “Theory and Research in the
Sociology of Education.” In Sociology of Educa-
tion: A Critical Reader (Second edition), edited by
Alan R. Sadovnik, 3-22. New York: Routledge.
Salamon, Julie. 2001. “When it Comes to TV,
Coveted Adolescents Prove to be Unpredictable.”
The New York Times, March 13, E.1.
Scheufele, Dietram A., and David Tewksbury. 2007.
“Framing, Agenda Setting, and Priming: The Evo-
lution of Three Media Effects Models.” Journal of
Communication 57:9-20.
Schudson, Michael. 2011. The Sociology of News
(Second edition). New York: W. W. Norton & Co.
———. 1995. The Power of News. Cambridge: Har-
vard University Press.
Scott, A. O. 2002. “A Hunger for Fantasy, an Empire to
Feed It.” The New York Times, June 16, 2.1.
Scott, Suzanne. 2009. “Repackaging Fan Culture: The
Regifting Economy of Ancillary Content Models.”
Transformative Works and Cultures 3. doi:10.3983/
twc.2009.0150.
Sekeres, Diane Carver. 2009. “The Market Child and
Branded Fiction: A Synergism of Children’s Lit-
erature, Consumer Culture, and New Literacies.”
Reading Research Quarterly 44(4): 399-414.
Stager, Gary S. 2006. “Has Educational Computing
Jumped the Shark?” Presentation at the Australian
Conference on Educational Computing, Cairns,
Australia, October 2-4, 2006.
Stasi, Mafalda. 2006. “The Toy Soldiers from Leeds:
The Slash Palimpest.” In Fan Fiction and Fan
Communities in the Age of the Internet: New Es-
says, edited by Karen Hellekson and Kristina
Busse, 115-33. Jefferson: McFarland & Co.
Stein, Louisa, and Kristina Busse. 2009. “Limit Play:
Fan Authorship between Source Text, Intertext, and
Context.” Popular Communication 7(4): 192-207.
Stelter, Brian. 2008. “A Marketing Move the ‘Mad Men’
Would Love.” The New York Times, September 01,
C.5.
212
D.E. Berkowitz / Journal of Media Literacy Education 4:3 (2012) 198-212
Thomas, Angela. 2007. “Blurring and Breaking
through the Boundaries of Narrative, Literacy, and
Identity in Adolescent Fan Fiction.” In New Lit-
eracies Sampler, edited by Michele Knobel and
Colin Lankshear, 137-166. New York: Peter Lang.
———. 2006. “Fan Fiction Online: Engagement, Criti-
cal Response and Affective Play through Writing.”
Australian Journal of Language & Literacy 29(3):
226-239.
Thomas, Sue. 2003. “‘The Trouble with Our Schools’: A
Media Construction of Public Discourses of
Queensland Schools.” Discourse: Studies in the
Cultural Politics of Education 24(1): 19-33.
———. 2002. “Contesting Education Policy in the
Public Sphere: Media Debates over Policies for the
Queensland School Curriculum.” Journal of Edu-
cational Policy 17(2): 187-198.
Thompson, Clive. 2005. “The Xbox Auteurs.” The New
York Times Magazine, August 07, 21.
Townsend, Jane S., and Patrick A. Ryan. 2012. “Media
Narratives and Possibilities for Teachers’ Embod-
ied Concepts of Self.” Journal of Media Literacy
Education 4(2): 149-158.
TWC Editor. 2008. “Interview with Henry Jenkins.”
Transformative Works and Cultures 1. doi:10.3983/
twc.2008.0061.
Van Dijk, Teun A. 2006. “Discourse and Manipulation.”
Discourse Society 17: 359-383.
———. 2003. Ideology: A Multidisciplinary Approach.
London: SAGE.
———. 2001. “Critical Discourse Analysis.” In The
Handbook of Discourse Analysis, edited by Debo-
rah Schiffrin, Deborah Tannen, and Heidi E. Ham-
ilton, 352-371. Malden: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
———. 1997. Discourse as Social Interaction. London:
SAGE.
———. 1993. “Principles of Discourse Analysis.” Dis-
course & Society 4(2): 249-283.
Verba, Joan M. 1996. Boldly Writing: A Trekker Fan
and Zine History, 1967-1987. Second edition. Min-
netonka: FTL Publications.
Walker, Rob. 2008. “Enterprising.” The New York Times
Magazine, December 28, 14.
———. 2006. “Tribute Brand.” The New York Times
Magazine, January 26, 22.
Warren, James. 2011. “Daley’s Legacy of Libraries,
Culture and Literacy.” The New York Times, March
06, A.27A.
Wodak, Ruth. 2001. “The Discourse-Historical Ap-
proach.” In Methods of Critical Discourse Analy-
sis, edited by Ruth Wodak and Michael Meyer, 63-
94. London: SAGE.
Wortham, Jenna. 2010. “Viral Video to Billboard 100.”
The New York Times, Sep 06, B.1.
Zhou, Yuqiong, and Patricia Moy. 2007. “Parsing
Framing Processes: The Interplay Between Online
Public Opinion and Media Coverage.” Journal of
Communication 57, 79-98.
