The Trans* Fantasy in Harry Langdon’s The Chaser

In the fall, I taught a seminar on American film Comedy with a particular focus on comic performance and slapstick. I included a range of lesser known figures but I also wanted to represent the big Four silent comedians — Keaton Lloyd, Chaplin, and Langdon. Langdon is often an afterthought these day since modern audiences often find it difficult to appreciate his slow-reaction style alongside the fast rough and tumble of his contemporaries. I ended up selecting The Chaser, one of the films where Langdon directed himself, pushing past the slander that Frank Capra fostered in The Name Above the Title that Langdon lost his way once he rejected Capra’s shaping role. This turned out to be one of the more popular films from the class with students intrigued by its difference from other silent comedy and especially its bold play with gender identity, which has to be seen to be believed. One MA student, Sabrina Sonner wrote an essay on the film as a Trans fantasy which suggests why Langdon may be especially meaningful to the generation coming of age right now.

The Trans* Fantasy in Harry Langdon’s The Chaser

by Sabrina Sonner

Introduction

Watching Harry Langdon in The Chaser, I am transfixed by his hat. Throughout the film, he appears as a philanderer in a night club, a guilty husband in court, a wife in the kitchen, a illicit fugitive, a uniformed captain, and a ghost-like apparition. He falls off a cliff in a runaway vehicle, lays eggs, kisses the iceman, and is nearly driven to suicide. And, throughout it all, the hat remains. 

This consistent signifier of his identity stays with him throughout the film, which takes the basic premise of The Husband (played by Harry Langdon) accused of infidelity and court ordered to “take his wife’s place in the kitchen, or serve six months in jail.”[1] He dons a dress and performs his wife’s role, while The Wife (played by Gladys McConnell) takes on her husband’s role. Left at home, Langdon must deal with unwanted advances from the iceman and bill collector. As a result, he tries and fails to kill himself, writing a note that states he is leaving because “no woman knows what it is to go without pants.”[2] At the golf club with his hyper-masculine friend, he rediscovers a masculine uniform, and through a series of mishaps returns home covered in white flour. Though his mother-in-law flees, his wife returns to his arms, and the same intertitle that opened the film closes it, proclaiming “In the beginning, God created man in his own image and likeness. A little later on, he created woman.”[3]

While it may be one of Langdon’s less discussed films, I believe The Chaser opens up unique spaces surrounding gender and identity through interweaving Langdon’s innocent star persona with the potential of comedy to disrupt societal expectations. Within the history of clowns and silent comedians, there exists a power to break away from normative societal values.[4] We see this idea in Langdon’s disruption of gender in the film, as his comedic identity remains consistent while his gender presentation wildly fluctuates. Additionally, the slapstick nature of the film opens up ideas around the body and what it is allowed to do. Though made to dress a certain way, Langdon is still able to freely use his body in the world in a way enviable to a trans* body. In the way Langdon is clothed and in his undamageable slapstick body, a trans* fantasy emerges. What if I could wear a dress and be seen as a woman? Or wear a suit and be seen as a man? The film highlights the absurdity of the world responding to a single gendered indicator so strongly, but also opens up a freeing daydream that asks, “What would happen if we could be seen this way?” Langdon’s body never bruises, breaks, or tears – it behaves how he wants it to. With mine, I consider thousands of dollars of surgery to get it to behave as I wish. In this conflux of gender non-conformity, traditionally gendered clothing, Langdon’s consistent star persona, and a freely controlled slapstick body, The Chaser creates a fantastical trans* space. 

In my journey through discovering my identity, I have understood it as the way one sees oneself internally, the way this is reflected to the world externally, and most importantly the way one searches to find a happy combination of the two. To that extent, this essay is structured in those three parts, pulling on theorists such as Jack Halberstam, Teresa de Lauretis, Louise Peacock, James Agee, and Muriel Andrin to connect ideas between comedy and queerness. 

Langdon’s Consistent Star Persona and the Queerness of Childhood

Throughout The Chaser, Langdon is depicted with an unwavering consistency through his identifiable comedic persona, including his blank face, childlike innocence, and, of course, that hat. Regardless of his attire in the film, the way in which he comedically responds to situations and the recognizability of his star persona shines through. This sense of his baby-faced naivete is detailed by James Agee is his essay on silent film comedy: 

“Like Chaplin, Langdon wore a coat which buttoned on his wishbone and swung out wide below, but the effect was very different: he seemed like an outsized baby who had begun to outgrow his clothes. The crown of his hat was rounded and the brim was turned up all around, like a little boy’s hat, and he looked as if he wore diapers under his pants. His walk was that of a child which has just gotten sure on its feet, and his body and hands fitted that age. His face was kept pale to show off, with the simplicity of a nursery-school drawing, the bright, ignorant, gentle eyes and the little twirling mouth…. He was a virtuoso of hesitations and of delicately indecisive motions, and he was particularly fine in a high wind, rounding a corner with a kind of skittering toddle, both hands nursing his hatbrim.”[5]

In The Chaser, we see this childlikeness in the consistency of his reactions, where he responds with a great deal of perplexity to the absurdity of the situations that he finds himself in, especially gendered rituals. Throughout the film, he seems unable to fully grasp any gendered roles assigned to him, both feminine and masculine. For instance, the charge he faces during the film is that of being an unfaithful or unruly husband. However, looking at the film’s depiction of this behavior, Langdon hardly seems the type. He goes to this club to eat peanuts and watch. Though slightly voyeuristic, this depiction is relatively tame in comparison to the way a philandering womanizer could appear. When he finishes in the club, he then dons a masculine uniform, which fails him in his goals of appearing the idealized husband. He fairs no better when he performs the wife’s role. In his dress, he seems uncomprehending of feminine ideas, such as the cooking behaviors he is asked to take on as well as understanding of reproduction, albeit that of chickens and eggs. When he returns to his masculine attire, he counters the hyper-masculinity of his friend while golfing. Within these scenarios, which are rife with gendered expectations, Langdon always fails to measure up, or even understand exactly what he’s being measured up to. 

Langdon’s child-like lack of understanding of gendered norms creates a parallel with Jack Halberstam’s writings on the queerness of childhood. When writing of childhood and its depictions in cinema, Halberstam writes: 

“There is nothing natural in the end about gender as it emerges from childhood; the hetero scripts that are forced on children have nothing to do with nature and everything to do with violent enforcements of hetero-reproductive domesticity. These enforcements, even when they can accommodate some degree of bodily difference, direct children toward regular understandings of the body in time and space. But the weird set of experiences that we call childhood stands outside adult logics of time and space. The time of the child, then, like the time of the queer, is always already over and still to come.[“6]

Though Langdon is not a literal child, his childlike nature evokes this queerness. He acts as a receptacle that the world places meaning on. As he attempts to sort through it, he appears as if he’s a child completely unaware of what is expected of him and encountering gendered expectations for the first time. In both his masculinized uniform and feminized wife’s attire, he seems out of place, like a child playing dress-up. Langdon’s character operates in a different logic from the rest of the world and, due to his specific star persona, encapsulates this childlike logic and queer aspect of the time of childhood. 

To illustrate the innocence and consistency of Langdon’s comedic persona in a specific example, throughout The Chaser, Langdon has this consistent deadpan reaction, where he faces the camera and blinks a couple times, uncomprehending the absurdity of the comedic bit that just happened. We see this throughout the film as a constant presence, whether he is reacting to a woman falling into his arms when he wears his masculine uniform, the iceman kissing him when he dons a dress, or when he lays an egg. Alongside his ever-constant hat is a solidified comedic identity that refuses to adapt to ever-changing gendered expectations. In Langdon’s confusion regarding the gendered expectations, and the consistency of his identity beneath it all, there is space within the film to question alongside Langdon exactly how valuable these societal expectations are. 

Additionally, I would argue that there’s a queerness to Langdon’s body as a slapstick body. His star persona adheres to ideas that Muriel Andrin considers writing of an unbreakable slapstick form:

“These are “bodies without organs,” immune to fragmentation or, when they do suffer fragmentation, insensitive to trauma. They remain whole no matter what the threat, displaying not a permanent moral integrity like melodramatic characters, but a lasting physical integrity… The slapstick world is a perfect place for instant healing.”[7]

There are many ways in this world that the trans* body can find itself under threat or in need of healing, whether it is due to growing rates of violence against transgender and gender-nonconforming people,[8] or trans* bodies themselves being voluntarily surgically modified to better fit one’s gender expression. The idea of the resilient slapstick body appears in The Chaser in a sequence near the end of the film, where Langdon hides in the trunk of a car that topples off a cliff and crashes through multiple billboards into his kitchen without troubling Langdon one bit. In a more serious and subtle way, the scene in which he fails to kill himself in several ways can be read as the trans*, slapstick body resisting its own demise and providing a protection that the individual needs despite their momentary wants. 

Altogether, the confused, youthful quality of Langdon’s star persona connects his performance to a queer period of childhood, and the slapstick nature of this comedic body opens spaces for a specifically trans* imagination of the carefree, freedom of physical expression. The internal reflection of identity within Langdon’s star role in this film establishes a consistency and queerness to his self that clashes with the way society views him throughout the film. 

Society, Gender, and The Clown Outside It All

While Langdon’s identity remains constant in the visibility of his comedic star persona to the audience, society takes gendered cues from his clothing and behavior and focuses on them to an absurd degree. Additionally, his role as a clown in the film places Langdon as a figure outside of societal boundaries to whom failure is central.  Louise Peacock writes of the clown as “an outsider and a truthteller” who can comment on the societies in which they live.[9] Peacock additionally writes of the way failure is a part of clowning: 

“Failure or ‘incompetence’ is a staple ingredient of clown performance… Clowns demonstrate their inability to complete whatever exploit they have begun. In doing so they speak to the inner vulnerability of the audience whose members are often bound by societal conventions which value success over failure.”[10]

The failures of Langdon within the film largely relate to his inability to adhere to gendered roles, such as his initial failings at masculinity that bring about the film’s inciting incident and his subsequent failures to perform his wife’s duties in the kitchen. In doing so, he highlights the constructed nature of the assignment of these duties based on gender. He places himself outside of the gendered expectations of society in a literal way in the opening scene, where he appears a dance club just to watch the activities. And in the comedic bits of the film, his inability to perform either masculinity or femininity allows the audience to consider the facades of those structures. In watching him actively try to learn and fail at these activities he’s been given based on his gender assignment, there is a trans* understanding of the failure to perform at the roles of the gender one is assigned at birth, as well as the complexity of learning the rituals of one’s own gender. 

The failings of the clown echo Jack Halberstam’s considerations of failure and queerness, solidifying Langdon’s placement in the film as a queer, comedic outsider. In Halberstam’s writings on queerness and failure, Halberstam writes: 

“The Queer Art of Failure dismantles the logics of successes and failure with which we currently live. Under certain circumstances failing, losing, forgetting, unmaking, undoing, unbecoming, not knowing may in fact offer more creative, more cooperative, more surprising ways of being in the world. Failing is something queers do and have always done exceptionally well; for queers failure can be a style, to cite Quentin Crisp, or a way of life, to cite Foucault, and it can stand in contrast to the grim scenarios of success that depend on “trying and trying again.”[11]

In applying Halberstam’s ideas around failure to the film, we can find joyous resistance in the way that Langdon fails at the tasks placed before him in the film. His placid reactions to his failures allow us to safely fantasize about the possibilities that open up before us if we too embrace this logic of failure. 

            Further considering the way the world interacts with Langdon by way of his encounters with the bill collector and iceman, we can apply ideas surrounding the technologies of gender from Teresa de Lauretis to the film. Within her essay “The Technology of Gender,” de Lauretis establishes gender as a construction that is inseparably connects gender, work, class, and race, writing, “social representation of gender affects its subjective construction and that, vice versa, the subjective representation of gender – or self-representation – affects its social construction.”[12] Given the complexity with which de Lauretis breaks down the social construction of gender, there is an absurdity to the simplicity to the way gender operates within the film when it comes to passing as a gender within the film. As soon as Langdon changes his clothes, the outside world chooses to see him as a woman. By changing one factor of his appearance, Langdon completely alters the way the world views his gender. In contrast, however, we still see Langdon as himself due to his aforementioned star persona, challenging the notion that gender operates this discretely. While the behavior of the men towards Langdon is largely disrespectful, leering at and nonconsensually kissing him, there is also a small space within these interactions to read an absurd form of respect. They see someone placing a feminine indicator on themself, and despite the obviously visible Harry Langdon beneath it, they choose to treat the individual as the presentation he puts forth into the world. Returning to de Lauretis’ theories, the film itself also operates as a technology that can expand and challenge notions of gender and, through this representation, hope to affect its societal construction. 

            The simplicity of the direct correlation between Langdon’s changing outfits and the way the world genders him opens up a fantasy that, while absurd, evokes a trans* desire to live within a world that could operate in the way that the world of The Chaser does. In Scott Balzerack’s writing on queered masculinity in Hollywood comedians, he brings up the way that “as a gendered subject, the male comedian rearranges (or, at times, rejects) heteronormative protocols.”[13]Viewing Langdon as a gendered subject within the film, he distorts and evades masculinity and femininity as much as he can, playing within a space that allows him to transform in an almost enviable way. 

Unifying Gendered Identity Through a Familiar Spectator

Between the tensions of Langdon’s constant identity to the audience and his shifting gender presentation to the world, one might wonder if the film offers a point of resolution of these external and internal identities. By its closing shot, the film leaves us with an image of Langdon remaining in his dress and hat and reuniting with his wife, who has returned to her more traditionally feminine clothes. Looking back at the role played by Gladys McConnell as The Wife in the film provides the answers and resolution we seek. 

At the start of the film, McConnell is seen talking nonstop over the phone at her silent husband, and it is her desire to divorce him that brings about the gender-swapping court order. While nothing in this order explicitly mentions her, in the following scenes we see her partially switch roles with her husband – she wears a blazer and tie with a skirt as an incomplete transference into his role. In this outfit, there are suggestions at her failures at femininity when she finds her husband’s suicide note and, believing him dead, sobs until her make-up runs to a heightened extent. While Langdon’s arc throughout the film depicts him failing at femininity in a skirt, McConnell fails at the same ideas of gender while dressed oppositely. In addition, despite the change in roles, she still sees him as her husband, referring to him as such with her friends later in the film. This contrasts with the starkly shifted view of Langdon’s gender by the iceman and bill collector. The film gives her the power to see his identity through the façade of his clothing. When Langdon returns to the house covered in flour, his mother-in-law runs out in fear of a ghost while McConnell, after a temporary fright, recognizes and embraces her husband. 

Within this ending moment, some of the more nuanced ideas of gender within the film come together. After having both the husband and wife change their gendered attires, reuniting them when the wife has changed back but the husband remains the same gives a sense of ambiguity around the return to gendered roles within the film. While there is a normative reading of this ending that reunites the heterosexual couple with each person in their place, the actual execution of it has two femininely clothed individuals reuniting. With McConnell recognizing her husband beneath it all, there is an acknowledgement of his identity separate from his presentation. In the space with his wife, Langdon can be seen for who he is, regardless of how he presents. The film closes on a final shot of Langdon with his usual puzzled reaction to his wife returning to him, albeit with a couple of smiles tossed in. Coupled with the closing title reminding us of God creating man in his image and creating woman later on, there is a hint at the queer, homosocial world predating woman, as well as a challenge to the audience in if these binary viewpoints still hold up after watching a film that so comedically unpacks the artificiality of their construction. 

Conclusion

By applying a trans* perspective to The Chaser, we can see the way that the film negotiates ideas gender, considering where it is performative, intrinsic, and a part of one’s identity. While there are complex structures around gender in society, there is something delightfully freeing about the space created by the film. In the comedic failures and childlike incomprehension of Langdon, there emerges a queerness in the film that is only heightened by its preoccupation with gender. There isn’t one specific trans* identity explored within the film, but a variety of resonances that makes an umbrella term more appropriate than a specific notion. For instance, in viewing a fantasy of wearing a dress and being seen as a woman, there’s a trans-feminine fantasy. In the idea that he remains a man beneath his clothing regardless of how everyone views him, we see the opposite in the way of a trans-masculine fantasy. And in his positioning throughout the film that remains as neither successfully the uniformed studly husband nor the submissive wife, but finding peace in his final image of a ghost-like version of himself, there’s a non-binary desire of finding a space separate from any of these rituals. Altogether, the film provides evokes a sense of trans* desire through the absurdity with which its gendered rituals exist, the connection between queerness and comedic failure, and the queerness that Langdon’s childlike persona. 

 Sabrina Sonner is a recent graduate of the University of Southern California’s Cinema and Media Studies Masters program. Their work focuses on queer studies, interactive media, and media that supports live communal forms of play. They have previously been featured at USC’s First Forum conference in 2021, where they examined late stage capitalism through a playfully destructive reimagining of the board game Monopoly. Outside of academia, Sabrina works professionally in new play development for theatre. 

Works Cited

Agee, James. “Comedy’s Greatest Era.” Life, 1949. https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/2019/11/17/comedys-greatest-era-james-agee/

Andrin, Muriel. “Back to the ‘Slap’: Slapstick’s Hyperbolic Gesture and The Rhetoric of Violence,” Slapstick Comedy (AFI Film Readers). Routledge, 2009.

Balzerack, Scott. “Someone Like Me for a Member.” Buffoon Men: Classic Hollywood Comedians and Queered Masculinity. Detroit: Wayne State University, 2013.

The Chaser. Harry Langdon. Harry Langdon Corporation. First National Pictures. 1928. 

De Lauretis, Teresa. 1987. “The Technology of Gender.” Technologies of Gender: Essays on Theory, Film, and Fiction. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1-30. 

“Fatal Violence Against the Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming Community in 2021.” Human Rights Campaign. 2021. https://www.hrc.org/resources/fatal-violence-against-the-transgender-and-gender-non-conforming-community-in-2021

Halberstam, Jack. “Becoming Trans*.” Trans*: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability. Oakland: University of California Press, 45-62. 2017.

Halberstam, Jack. The Queer Art of Failure. Duke University Press Books. 2011. 

Peacock, Louise, “Clowns and Clown Play,” in Peta Tait and Katie Lavers (eds.), The Routledge Circus Studies Reader. London: Routledge, 2016. 

[1] The Chaser. Harry Langdon. Harry Langdon Corporation. First National Pictures. 1928.

[2] The Chaser

[3] The Chaser

[4] Peacock, Louise, “Clowns and Clown Play,” in Peta Tait and Katie Lavers (eds.), The Routledge Circus Studies Reader. London: Routledge, 2016. 90.

[5] Agee, James. “Comedy’s Greatest Era.” Life, 1949.

[6] Halberstam, Jack. “Becoming Trans*.” Trans*: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability. Oakland: University of California Press, 61. 2017.

[7] Andrin, Muriel. “Back to the ‘Slap’: Slapstick’s Hyperbolic Gesture and The Rhetoric of Violence,” Slapstick Comedy (AFI Film Readers). Routledge, 2009. 232

[8] “Fatal Violence Against the Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming Community in 2021.” Human Rights Campaign. 2021. https://www.hrc.org/resources/fatal-violence-against-the-transgender-and-gender-non-conforming-community-in-2021

[9] Peacock, 88.

[10] Peacock, 86.

[11] Halberstam, Jack. The Queer Art of Failure. Duke University Press Books. 2011. 2-3.

[12] De Lauretis, Teresa. 1987. “The Technology of Gender.” Technologies of Gender: Essays on Theory, Film, and Fiction. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 8-9. 

[13] Balzerack, Scott. “Someone Like Me for a Member.” Buffoon Men: Classic Hollywood Comedians and Queered Masculinity. Detroit: Wayne State University, 2013. 4

Global Fandom Jamboree Conversation: Hyo Jen Lee (South Korea) and Kirsten Pike (Qatar) (Part Two)

illustrator/SF writer Park Moon Young.

Response to Kirsten Pike's response

(by Hyo Jin Kim)

Dear Kirsten and everyone,

Thank you so much for your thoughtful response.

You raised several interesting issues: Korean feminist SF (what the government's scientific discourse is in terms of reaching the public, especially women and girls; how Korean feminist SF expresses Korean sentiment and experiences; what common themes/characteristics of Korean feminist SF are; similarities vs. differences of Korean feminist SF and Western SF; male participants in feminist book clubs), Doctor Who fandom and comparisons with the Scully effect, and the response for the 13th Doctor, Jodie Whittaker.

First, I want to start with some good news and changes in terms of the science culture in South Korea. Since my dissertation, the Korean government and science communicators and experts have reached out to the public for science culture. ‘The Science & Culture Consultative Group’ was established last month, April 2022. This group will work mainly on several missions, such as spreading scientific and cultural activities, designing scientific projects, installing collaborative platforms for developing scientific culture, providing research/suggestions for scientific culture and its policies, filming and producing scientific images and broadcastings, holding academic conferences and seminars, and completing other voluntary scientific and cultural activities. As this group supports and encourages voluntary scientific and cultural activities, it may include some SF fandom activities. I am excited about the group and looking forward to their actions. This group will be the bridge between the public (hopefully include SF fans) and the government in terms of science culture. The government’s efforts in science culture have been accomplished through KOFAC and WISET. The Korea Foundation for the Advancement of Science and Creativity (KOFAC) leads science culture and develops policies as a quasi-governmental and non-profit organization under the Ministry of Science and ICT. In addition, the Korea Foundation for Women in Science, Engineering, and Technology (WISET) is a public institution funded by the government to encourage girls and women in the STEAM (A stands for Art) fields. According to WISET, the gender gap in natural science and engineering has decreased by 1.0% and 10.2%.

Korean SF and especially Korean feminist SF may step ahead of the government's science discourse. Korean feminist SF encourages readers to experience the future and even the current status quo, such as sexist oppression, discrimination, climate change and facing and living with non-human species, including aliens, AI, etc. Korean feminist SF has become more popular with the public since the 2010s. Statistics from the online bookstore ‘Aladin’ show the growth of female readers in their 20s to 40s, as I mentioned in my opening statement. With the reboot of feminism, new young female SF writers such as Cho-Yeop Kim and Se-Rang Chung and their work have become popular with the public. Cho-Yeop Kim won the 43rd Korea Artist Prize with her If We Cannot Move at the Speed of Light (Hubble, 2019) and the 11th Young Writer's Award with her following works. Se-Rang Chung's work School Nurse Ahn Eunyoung (Minumsa, 2015) aired on Netflix's original series in 2020. Media industries also showed interest and started making cinematic dramas such as 'SF8', eight directors with eight original Korean SFs in AI, AR, robot, game, fantasy, horror, supernatural, etc. Now Korean readers and audiences have more chances to meet Korean SF through books and media. The entrance barrier of SF has become lower and easier than before for the public.

As I mentioned in the opening statement, book club participants strongly tied with Korean feminist SF compared to Western SF. One reason might be the Korean storytelling. Participants and the public readers read Korean names, places, and even world views in Korean. They are used to reading characters' Western words and Western world views, making them feel distant from the genre. However, young SF Korean writers' works depict Korean characters (even many Korean female characters, single, married, young, and old) with Korean names, places, and cultures, allowing readers to feel comfortable with Korean SF. Korean feminist SF is mainly concerned with society's various issues and presents many diverse voices of Korean culture. For example, South Korea's constitutional court ordered the law banning abortion must be revised by the end of 2020. It's been 66 years since abortion became illegal. At the end of 2020, several SF writers joined the #abolition of abortion campaign by writing and sharing short SF stories. Korean SF writers openly associate their work with social issues. Korean feminist SF reflects current social issues and lets readers consider what-if situations. Therefore, Korean feminist SF book club participants engage strongly with Korean feminist SF.

Kirsten asked about Korean feminist SF's common themes or characteristics, and I'm working on analyzing and researching as same theme of a book project this year. Fandom research and the sub-genre of feminist SF are rare and getting to start in South Korea. So far, I've seen in Korean feminist SF themes of disability, gender issues, various types of violence toward women and others, stereotypes of women and others, prejudice against women and others, posthuman, patriarchy etc. Analyzing common themes and characteristics of Korean feminist SF is in progress. As a Korean feminist SF reader, I’ve got the impression that every single voice seems to matter to Korean SF writers. Korean feminist SF and Western feminist SF have in common that feminist issues meet the SF genre. Feminist SF writers are actively involved with social issues and let readers find solutions through their imaginations. The difference between Korean feminist SF and Western SF is how feminist issues reflect Korean society. As famous Western feminist SF books have been translated into Korean, readers feel Western feminist SF to be learned rather than empathetic. Every culture deals with different feministic issues. This is why Korean readers get more comfortable and engage tightly with Korean feminist SF. Kirsten wondered if there were male participants in the feminist SF book club. There were no male participants in the "Meet without meeting; 500 days' journey of reading feminist sf" club, but there were some male participants in other feminist SF book clubs I participated. Those male participants had entirely different attitudes toward feministic issues. They joined the book club because they wanted to learn more and understand feministic issues through the book and discussion.

Kirsten asked the Doctor Who fandom about the Scully effect, however, I could not find any academic research in South Korea. SF fandom studies in South Korea are few. In the part of my dissertation, some Whovians learn and understand complicated physics terms through Doctor Who. In my dissertation, I suggested SF fandom as a part of science communication. Scully effect on The X-File seems to follow a similar path, approaching SF fandom as the part of science communication in popular culture. Therefore, finding Scully effect of The X-Files or any other SF in South Korea will be fascinating and could be a good research project for WISET. I was able to find a news article about the fandom of The X-Files. How I remembered The X-Files is unique and different from these days’ SF fandom because of the dubbed version. Kirsten mentioned watching the dubbed version of The X-Files, and there was a massive fanbase surrounding dubbing actors in the '90s PC era in South Korea. There were several fan communities for the dubbing actors and main characters, Mulder and Scully. Still, many fans remember Mulder and Scully as the dubbed version of the voices. One news article shows that The X-Files returned in 2016, and the dubbing actors as Mulder and Scully got the information from the fans and celebrated together. The dubbing actors were as famous and vital as the original actors of Korean The X-Files’ fans. In the '90s in South Korea, I and Korean people were familiar with dubbed versions of television programs such asMacGyver, The X-Files, and other foreign films and television programs. The dubbed actors were top-rated as well. I remember MacGyver's Korean dubbing actor's voice. I was shocked when I heard the actual voice of MacGyver (Richard Dean Anderson). It didn't sound right to me. I am sure this kind of experience is common for people who grew up in the '90s. The popularity and fandom of dubbed versions of films and television programs may differ. Focusing on the differences may present how international fans deal with original characters' voices vs. dubbing actors' voices in a different context. At the same time, the '90s PC era is significant to SF fandom studies in South Korea. That period began with SF fandom, translating Western SFs, and creating Korean SFs. Some current famous SF writers/critics have been actively involved with the '90s PC era since. Several Korean SF scholars consider the '90s PC era a significant time for Korean SF fandom, and research is in progress.

As Kirsten asked about the response of the 13th Doctor, the Jodie Whittaker of Korean Whovians, I would say this might be another good start for the future Doctor Who fandom studies. I was pretty excited about Jodie Whittaker being the 13th Doctor because The Doctor's gender has never been revealed on the show. Though I had to dig deeper for the research, glancing over several Doctor Who online fan communities' comments seem negative responses. As some fans welcomed the female Doctor, they were disappointed with her performance and storytelling. I don't think this is about Jodie Whittaker's performance but fans' frustrations with accepting the female Doctor. The program has run for more than 60 years. Old and even new Whovians are already too familiar with male Doctors. It might take some time to adjust to new perspectives, such as gender or race issues, on the Doctor.

It was an excellent opportunity to learn about Qatar girls’ Disney princess fandom and discuss dubbed versions of films and television programs. It’s been fun to be part of this Global fandom Jamboree Conversation. Always exciting to meet a friendly but inspiring colleague. Thanks again to Kirsten for the thoughtful feedbacks, and hope everyone also enjoyed our conversations.

Part 2: Second Response to Hyo Jin Kim

(by Kirsten Pike)

Thanks so much for your thoughtful reflections, HJ! You’ve raised a lot of excellent points and questions for me to think about. I offer below a few initial thoughts.

With regard to Arab girls creating their own princess-themed media and cultural productions … I, too, was intrigued by this discovery.  It immediately brought to mind Henry Jenkins’s pioneering research on female fans of Star Trek, who—in writing new stories about beloved characters—remade popular texts “in their own image, forcing them to respond to their needs and to gratify their desires.”[1] Broadly speaking, the participants in my study tended to create princess-themed narratives that opened up possibilities of greater freedom and independence for girls. And their creations spanned a variety of forms, including songs, videos, games, short stories, photos, and theatrical plays. In a story written as part of a fourth-grade school project, for instance, one participant reimagined Belle from Beauty and the Beast (1991) as a beast, thereby defying customary ideas about how a Disney princess should look and act. Another participant wrote, produced, and starred in a princess-themed play at her high school, which she described as “an Arab version of Cinderella.” However, unlike Disney’s Cinderella (1950), her story challenged gendered conventions in that the heroine—despite being pursued by a prince—opted not to marry so that she could live a more independent existence.[2]

While it’s difficult to pinpoint the precise combination of factors that fostered the girls’ creative (and in some cases, feminist) sensibilities, it’s clear that some participants were encouraged to explore their gendered interests in school-related assignments and activities prior to college. And given that all the girls I interviewed were former students at Northwestern University in Qatar—an American university with staff, faculty, and students from around the world—I think it’s safe to say that they were already interested in and receptive to diverse viewpoints, with childhood influences also surely coming from their family and friends as well as media and other educational/cultural institutions. Indeed, many of the girls I interviewed cited Sheikha Moza, the chairperson of Qatar Foundation (and mother of the current Emir), as a major role model, especially given that her educational initiatives helped international universities come to Qatar, thus paving the way for more young women to earn college degrees here.[3]

The question of how dubbing informs reception within specific cultural contexts is an interesting one, especially when audiences grow up consuming an eclectic mix of local and global media. In the case of the girls I interviewed, all were fluent in English and Arabic, and they moved easily between Western and Middle Eastern media. Regarding language preferences in Disney media, a few patterns emerged in my findings. First, watching Disney films in English was the preferred mode for girls in my initial study, with ten out of 14 (71%) stating that the original films were their favorite. Some noted that Disney’s English-language releases were the most “authentic” and therefore adored, while others commented that because meaning can be lost in translation, they preferred watching the originals. Four girls in the study (29%) said that they favored the Egyptian-dubbed versions of Disney films because the dialogue, jokes, and/or cultural references were funnier.[4] Interestingly, when eight of the original 14 participants later answered questions about Jeem TV’s local adaptations of Disney films and TV shows (which, beginning in 2013, were dubbed into classical Arabic and edited to be more culturally appropriate for Arab youth), none reported a fondness for these versions. Even though the girls appreciated some of Jeem’s gender-productive editing strategies, including its tendency to eliminate derogatory comments about women and to replace comments about a female character’s looks with remarks about her intelligence, they felt that classical Arabic sounded “too formal” and/or “too serious,” which made them feel distanced from these texts. Ultimately, this discovery highlights the challenges faced by indigenous media producers who strive to create culturally relevant content for local audiences, while also navigating children’s desires for popular global fare.[5]

It was interesting to read your comments about the circulation of Disney content in Korea, including how most parents and young people prefer subtitled rather than Korean-dubbed Disney films because they can help viewers learn English. A few of the girls in my initial study reported that they learned to speak English by watching Disney films and TV shows too. Still, I agree that locally dubbed versions of popular media can have important benefits. One participant in my second study seemed to feel similarly when she suggested that watching Disney programming in classical Arabic on Jeem TV might sharpen Arabic language proficiency among local youth, which some adults fear is in decline because of the country’s rapid globalization over the past fifteen years. However, given the distancing effect described above, perhaps local youth (especially those from the Arab Gulf) would be more receptive to Jeem’s adaptations if they were dubbed in the local khaliji dialect as opposed classical Arabic.

Although my research on Disney fandom in Qatar has so far focused on Arab girls, I agree that it would be fascinating to explore the views of Disney fans living here who come from various racial, ethnic, and national backgrounds. While my chapter “Princess Culture in Qatar” (2015) included an analysis of girls’ responses to portrayals of Middle Eastern characters in Aladdin (1992), it would be interesting for a future study to examine girls’ ideas about representations of race and ethnicity (and their intersections with other markers of identity) across a broader body of Disney princess films, including some of the more recent releases, such as Frozen (2013), Moana (2016), and Frozen II (2019). When I conducted my initial interviews with Arab girls in 2013, a couple of participants talked about how much they admired the more unconventional Disney princesses, including Mulan from Mulan (1998) and Merida from Brave (2012). I would love to find out if, how, and to what extent this interest in non-traditional princesses has evolved with some of Disney’s contemporary releases. And I’d love to learn more about the reception of Disney princess media in South Korea too. 

I’m so glad to have had this opportunity to discuss examples of youthful female fandom in Korea and Qatar with you, HJ, as well as to participate in this broader Global Fandom Jamboree. I look forward to seeing how the insights shared via these cross-cultural exchanges over the past few months will continue to evolve and inform our scholarship (and fandom) as time moves forward!

Notes

[1] Jenkins (III), Henry. “Star Trek Rerun, Reread, Rewritten: Fan Writing as Textual Poaching.” Critical Studies in Mass Communication 5.2 (1988): 103.

[2] Pike, Kirsten. “Princess Culture in Qatar: Exploring Princess Media Narratives in the Lives of Arab Female Youth.” In Princess Cultures: Mediating Girls’ Imaginations and Identities, eds. Miriam Forman-Brunell and Rebecca C. Hains, 139-160. New York: Peter Lang, 2015: 154-155.

[3] Arab girls who grow up in Qatar are often encouraged by their families to stay close to home after graduating from high school; Arab males, however, often attend university abroad.

[4] Pike, “Princess Culture in Qatar,” 146.

[5] Pike, Kirsten. “Disney in Doha: Arab Girls Negotiate Global and Local Versions of Disney Media.” Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication 11 (2018): 72-90.

Global Fandom Jamboree Conversation: Hyo Jin Kim (South Korea) and Kristen Pike (Qatar) (Part One)

"Disney Live! Mickey's Music Festival" in Doha, Qatar in 2014

Dear Kirsten and everyone,                                                                                  

I am very happy to be part of this Global fandom project, discussing Disney princesses and their fandom. I was delighted to read Kirsten's opening statement especially Arab females' reaction to these princesses was fascinating. The study results did not report previous media or feminist critics' adverse effects on gender roles, body image, and love interests. Instead, the unexpected and captivating results captured Arab girls' participatory Disney princess culture. Thus, I wonder about Arab female youths and their culture—what makes them create their own princess story, and what is in it? Per Kirsten's study, girls enjoy and consume Disney princess media and products and use the content to create another cultural product incorporating "their gendered interests and concerns." This makes me wonder about Arab girls' gendered interests and concerns. It would be interesting to compare Disney princess fandom in different countries/cultures if possible. Each culture may consume these princesses differently. I want to know these differences and their makeup. 

What strikes me is that the girls' storytelling is riveting. This is the part where participatory fan culture steps in. A couple of questions pop up. First, how did these girls know or notice their gendered interests and concerns relative to Disney princesses? What are these gendered interests and concerns? Second, what made these participants very creative and active in telling their stories? These questions may reveal the possible factor for these young female participants' creativity and feministic activity. Did specific social changes or the school system encourage them? What of generational influence (for example, their parents' feministic awareness compared to the previous generation)? Third, why did Arab girls create stories? Were there any common themes? Or any specific topics related to their culture? How did they differ compared to Disney's original princess story? I was just excited Arab girls actively recreate their story through Disney princesses. They are not just consuming Disney but also creating their own culture. Understanding Arab girls' Disney fandom can lead to another perspective on Disney princesses. In addition, Qatar's population drives another research idea, comparing other female youth (different cultural-based) of similar age, consuming Disney film/television, such as Asian girls who live in Qatar vs. Arab girls in Qatar. I am interested in how ethnicity or different cultures may affect media consumption. 

Another exciting result of the initial study was the top appealing Disney princesses are Cinderella and Belle, and most girls liked a white princess. Although Kirsten's study did not address any influences on body images, growing up with colored skin, and watching and liking white princesses might give different experiences. When I grew up, I remember there was a 'skin color' crayon—the color of white princesses' skin color in Disney films and television, a bright pink—that has disappeared and does not exist anymore in South Korea. I know it is shocking that there was a specific skin color crayon. Although the racist crayon is gone, whitening beauty products are prevalent in most Asian countries. It could be part of imperial Whiteness in Asia. In some way, Disney is still responsible for girls' body image/skin color. I know Kirsten's participants like Cinderella and Belle because of their characters, not their skin color; however, I'd like to know how Arab girls consume the skin colors of Disney princesses. 

Disney princesses have changed in three different periods. The first era is Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Cinderella (1950), and Sleeping Beauty (1959). Thirty years later, the second era included characters from The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), Pocahontas (1995), and Mulan (1998). The last era's princesses appear in The Princess and the Frog (2009), Tangled (2010), Brave (2012), and Frozen (2013) (England et al., 2011)[1]. Kirsten's initial study falls in the second era. Since the global popularity of Frozen, I wonder if there are any Disney princess trend changes with girls. Alternatively, did previous participants see Frozen or Disney princesses from the same era differently? How do audiences/fans respond to Disney's changes with princesses? 

As Kirsten mentioned, organizations such as the Doha Film Institute (DFI) and The Short Film Lab try to make local productions, but they do not do enough to produce local contents. Are there any government support or policies to encourage local media production? I am also curious about how media audiences respond to local productions and the popularity of local media content compared to foreign/imported productions. This curiosity leads me to think that the more foreign/imported media production gets popular, the less chance there will be for local/indigenous media products to be produced based on the media industry perspective. Therefore, I'd like to know the dynamics of the media industry in Qatar, how the government relates to supporting or encouraging local media productions, and how audiences react.

Another part of Kirsten's research topic on dubbing may apply to some countries importing Disney films and television programs, including South Korea. Arab girls' positive responses to "cultural surgeries" are interesting. In the description of participants, they are comfortable with English. As they do not have any language issues and prefer dubbed versions of Disney films and television, it makes me wonder again, what social circumstances support these young female participants? In South Korea, Disney films and television are an excellent way to learn English, relating to higher education fever, especially in English. Parents, kids, and young adults prefer a subtitled version of Disney rather than a dubbed version. However, the value of a dubbed version is crucial, in my opinion. Nowadays, media critics criticize the globalization phenomenon in media wiping out local and indigenous cultures. The translator of Lost in South Korea mentioned the value of dubbing, which is another way to create the show from a Korean perspective. He said dubbing is not just a direct translation of language but also links two different cultures to make sure audiences understand the contents based on their cultural experiences. I agree with him on the value of dubbing; however, the audiences seem to think differently in South Korea. Therefore, some networks air foreign films and television shows in a subtitled version instead of airing a dubbed version. I wonder how general audiences reflect on dubbing and classical Arabic editing. 

Dear HJ (and everyone ),

Thanks so much for sharing your opening statement; I’m delighted to have the opportunity to discuss it with you as part of this Global Fandom Jamboree! You raise several interesting points about fans of science fiction (SF) in South Korea as well as government efforts to spark public interest in science culture more broadly. It’s disappointing to learn that the government’s science culture events so far have not included the texts or practices of SF fandom. But you make a great point about how government initiatives might benefit by doing so. To that end, I wondered if you could say more about how you see feminist SF, specifically, in relation to the government’s efforts. For example, to what extent does Korean feminist science fiction work for or against the government’s science discourses? How might Korean feminist SF be utilized to improve the government’s outreach to the public about science, especially women and girls? I’m not sure if any of the science culture events that you mentioned (e.g., the Korean Science Fair) are circulating gender-specific discourses that encourage women and girls to pursue STEM fields; but, either way, it’s exciting to ponder how Korean feminist SF might be harnessed to further promote (or jumpstart) those efforts. 

Reading your comments about Dr. Who brought back a memory of when I lived and worked in South Korea for a year in the mid-1990s. At that time, The X-Files was all the rage, and the family I lived with watched a Korean-dubbed version of it. I’m not sure if any of the fans that you engaged with during your research discussed this show, but it’s interesting to think about how and why certain SF TV shows have resonated with Korean viewers at particular historical moments, and why certain SF shows inspire young viewers to go into STEM fields (i.e., the “Scully Effect”).[1] Was there a similar effect on female viewers of The X-Files in Korea? And do we see that effect with Dr. Who? Given your interesting insights about “Whovians,” I was curious how the casting of Jodie Whittaker (the first female to play “The Doctor” title role) on Dr. Who has been received by Korean fans. I would imagine that female fans might have seen this as an exciting update to the long-running series, especially against the backdrop of the gender-related social movements (e.g., #MeToo) that you mention as having contributed to the recent growth of feminist SF in Korea.

I enjoyed learning about your research projects on the two different feminist SF book clubs in Korea. In particular, I was intrigued by the fact that in both clubs, participants felt emotionally distanced from translations of Western SF texts but had a strong affinity for Korean feminist SF texts. To that end, you noted that the expression of specifically Korean sentiments and experiences seemed to resonate more strongly with book club members. I was wondering if you might be able to say a bit more about what those sentiments and/or experiences are, as well as how some Korean feminist SF authors are tapping into them. For instance, are there certain themes and/or characteristics of Korean feminist SF texts that appeal to Korean fans? How are feminist elements in Korean SF similar to and/or different from feminist sensibilities in some of the Western texts that the Korean book club participants engaged with? In addition to the diverse topics that were discussed in the “500 Days’ Journey of Reading Feminist SF” club, it was heartening to learn about how the club functioned more broadly as a safe space for female participants to share their everyday experiences. Out of curiosity, did either book club include male participants? My sense from what you wrote is that these were female-oriented spaces, but if males were participating, I would love to hear more about their interest in and/or views about feminist SF.

In thinking about how feminist SF fandom in South Korea relates to Disney fandom amongst girls in Qatar, what really jumps out at me is how language and cultural specificity seem to be working in each context. While feminist narratives produced by Korean authors appealed more strongly to the members of the two book clubs than translations of Western texts, the girls in my study tended to report the opposite of this pattern when they discussed the original English-language versions of Disney films and TV shows and the versions that were dubbed into classical Arabic (and edited to be more culturally appropriate for Arab youth) by staff at the youth-oriented channel, Jeem TV, in Qatar. While the girls that I interviewed understood that Jeem’s adaptations of Disney content were designed, in part, to help preserve and affirm the country’s Arabic language and cultural traditions, they also felt incredibly distanced from these media texts. This was largely related to the fact that, like most Arabic speakers, they use classical Arabic to write but not generally to speak (using, instead, the khaliji dialect of the Arab Gulf). Thus, Jeem TV’s attempt at “localizing” Disney’s content for the benefit of Arab youth in Qatar (and the broader MENA region) actually created a kind of cultural dissonance, with girls reporting that the dialogue sounded much too formal to be enjoyable. As such, the participants voiced a preference for either the original English-language versions of Disney films and TV shows (which some perceived as the most “authentic”) or the Egyptian-dubbed versions that they encountered on TV or in movie theaters in the early 2000s. Interestingly, a couple of the Qatari girls in my study told me that they preferred the Egyptian-dubbed versions of Disney films and TV shows because the jokes and comedic dialogue were funnier in that dialect than they were in English. Although I’m not exactly sure where this takes us, perhaps language and cultural specificity are topics to consider more fully as we continue discussing fandom across different media texts, cultural contexts, and feminist sensibilities in Korea and Qatar.

Notes

[1] For useful information and statistics about the “Scully Effect” in the U.S., see: “The Scully Effect: I Want to Believe in STEM.” Featuring research by 21st Century Fox, the Geena Davis Institute on Gender and Media, and J. Walter Thompson Intelligence (2018). Accessible at: https://seejane.org/research-informs-empowers/the-scully-effect-i-want-to-believe-in-stem/

[1] England, Dawn E., Descartes, Lara, & Collier-Meek, Melissa A. (2011). Gender role portrayal

and the Disney princesses. Sex Roles, 64(1), 555-567. 

Global Fandom Jamboree: Kirsten Pike (Qatar)

"Disney Live! Mickey's Music Festival" in Doha, Qatar in 2014

Hello! My name is Kirsten Pike, and I’m an assistant professor in the Communication Program at Northwestern University in Qatar (NU-Q), where I teach and conduct research in the areas of girls’ and children’s media culture, film and television studies, and feminist media history. Some of my research explores representations of feminism and femininity in U.S. girls’ media (especially teen media of the late 1960s and 1970s) as well as girls’ responses to those depictions. Another area of my research examines Arab girls’ engagements with both Western and non-Western media, including Disney TV shows and independent films made by youth in Qatar.

My initial interest in Arab girls’ interactions with Disney and other princess-themed media stemmed from my experience teaching a Girls’ Media Culture class at NU-Q in 2012. This is where I first learned of my students’ passion for all things Disney, and conversations I was having in the classroom inspired me to learn more. So, in 2013 I gained IRB-approval to conduct in-depth interviews with 14 Arab female college students who grew up in the Middle East on their experiences with and opinions about princess-themed media, including Disney films and TV shows. One of the findings of this initial study was that while the girls enjoyed and avidly consumed Disney princess media and products during their youth, they also used this content as a springboard to create new cultural productions more in line with their gendered interests and concerns. Through creative stories, plays, games, videos, and photography, the girls actively challenged dominant themes in Disney princess media, especially the emphasis on heterosexual romance and marriage as well as unrealistic ideals of female beauty.[1]

My research has expanded over the years to include various methodological approaches and lines of inquiry. One of my recent studies, for instance, explores how Jeem TV (formerly Al Jazeera Children’s Channel)—a network that targets 7 to 12-year-olds across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)—is adapting Disney content to make it more culturally appropriate for Arab youth. Specifically, it explores how Jeem TV is dubbing content into classical Arabic and rewriting and re-editing it to eliminate themes and images perceived to be unsuitable for Arab children, such as sorcery, violence, and romance. Because the network’s “cultural surgeries” are dramatically changing the gendered meanings and messages of Disney’s original content, another prong of this research explores Arab girls’ responses to Jeem’s adaptations. Ultimately, while many participants in the study disagreed with attempts to strictly censor romantic themes in Disney media (such as by cutting romance completely from a film), most supported minor edits to visual images and dialogue. This was especially true if such changes appeared to improve representations of women and girls, such as when a comment about a character’s physical beauty was replaced with a comment about her intelligence. Still, a couple of girls were adamantly against Jeem’s alterations, perceiving them as corruptions of the original texts.[2]

As this snapshot of some of my research with Arab girls likely suggests, fan studies and fandom in Qatar are both shaped by globalization and transnational media flows. Although organizations such as the Doha Film Institute (DFI) and Short Film Lab are doing vital work to cultivate local filmmaking talent, there is still not a lot of original film and television content being made in Qatar. As a result, local TV channels, such as Jeem TV (for preteens) and Baraem TV (for preschoolers), rely heavily on foreign films and TV shows to fill their schedules. This, combined with the rapid rise of satellite technologies and internet access/use in Arab Gulf countries over the past two decades, means that most young people who grow up here engage with transnational media as a matter of course. Some of the most popular media among Arab female college students in Qatar today include Turkish television shows, Korean serials, K-pop, Japanese anime, and Disney films and TV shows. Interestingly, the reliance on foreign media content by local and regional TV networks has sometimes resulted in Qatari youth being surprised to learn that some series they watched as kids, such as Arabic-dubbed Japanese anime programs that aired on Dubai’s Spacetoon TV channel in the early 2000s, originated in Japan—not the United Arab Emirates. Of course, the global and transnational nature of fandom and fan studies in Qatar is also shaped by the makeup of the population. Although Qatar is now home to some 2.9 million people, Qatari nationals account for less than 15% of the total population with expatriate workers, students, and residents from countries all over the world comprising the rest of the populace. While my own research has focused largely on Arab female fans of Disney media in Doha, other recent scholarship about fandom in Qatar has explored female fans of K-pop, male and female fans of Turkish television shows, and male and female sports fans.[3]

Although fandom in Qatar is shaped by transnational and global forces, it is also informed by local customs and practices. For instance, when I asked Arab girls which Disney princess films appealed to them the most and why, many made connections between a heroine’s virtues and values advocated in their Arab upbringing, such as working hard (Cinderella) or pursuing an education (Belle). Another interesting finding of my first study was that 12 of the 14 participants (86%) identified a white princess as their favorite, with Belle and Cinderella receiving the most votes and none choosing Jasmine, even though she’s supposedly from the Middle East. Although this finding raises concerns about Disney’s role in promoting whiteness as an ideal, it’s useful to consider it within a broader cultural context. That is, many girls in the study—all but one of whom were Muslim—reported being turned off by Disney’s tendency to sexualize and exoticize princesses of color, including Jasmine. Given how Muslim female youth from Qatar and other Arab Gulf countries typically practice modesty by wearing an abaya (i.e., robe) over their clothes and shayla (i.e., scarf) over their hair, we can better understand the girls’ apparent preference for more chaste Disney princesses, who are white.

Perhaps it’s worth mentioning that financial security also shapes fandom among young people in Qatar. As one of the ten wealthiest countries in the world, many Arab girls who grew up here—especially Qatari nationals—come from privileged economic backgrounds; as a result, some enjoy affirming their fandom through a range of consumer practices. While a couple of the girls I interviewed spoke of recording onto VHS tapes Egyptian-dubbed Disney films that aired on TV as a way to watch their favorite films over and over again when they were young, many others described their vast collections of commercially released Disney films and TV shows, some of which they bought on vacations to Europe and/or the U.S. Many girls also discussed visiting Disney theme parks (some, multiple times), with one reporting that she spent an entire summer at a villa in Disneyland Paris. Traveling outside of Qatar to engage in Disney fan practices is also a part of male youth culture; for instance, one former male student shared with me the details of a trip he made to California to attend events and tours that were offered to members of D23—Disney’s official fan club. While it would be interesting for a future study to compare Disney fandom among male and female youth in Qatar, it would also be worth considering more fully how economic forces are shaping fan practices.

If we look at fandom simultaneously through local and global lenses, we find interesting patterns, such as the importance of economic status and custom in shaping expressions of fandom, which might combine acceptance (e.g., of U.S. consumer culture) and negotiation and/or disavowal (e.g., of U.S. social mores and prejudices) into a single act of fan participation. In addition, Qatar’s place as a site of transnational media flows without its own native production pipeline means that the average local fan has a broad range of tastes for global media products. Such a profile begs for further investigation into how fans’ interactions with different media artifacts may affect their individual and/or collective expressions of fan allegiance. Ultimately, as we see from this Global Fandom Jamboree, examining fandom as a complex intersection of the global and local gives fan culture a rich and dense texture and raises many new lines of inquiry.

Notes

[1] For additional details, see: Pike, Kirsten. “Princess Culture in Qatar: Exploring Princess Media Narratives in the Lives of Arab Female Youth.” In Princess Cultures: Mediating Girls’ Imaginations and Identities, eds. Miriam Forman-Brunell and Rebecca C. Hains, 139-160. New York: Peter Lang, 2015.

[2] For additional details, see: Pike, Kirsten. “Disney in Doha: Arab Girls Negotiate Global and Local Versions of Disney Media.”Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication 11 (2018): 72-90.

[3] See, for example: Malik, Saadia Izzeldin. “The Korean Wave (Hallyu) and Its Cultural Translation by Fans in Qatar.” International Journal of Communication 13 (2019): 5734-5751; Berg, Miriam. “The Importance of Cultural Proximity in the Success of Turkish Dramas in Qatar.” International Journal of Communication 11 (2017): 3415-3430; and Theodorakis, Nicholas D. and Daniel Wann, Ahmed Al-Emadi, Yannis Lianopoulos, and Alexandra Foudouki. “An Examination of Levels of Fandom, Team Identification, Socialization Processes, and Fan Behaviors in Qatar.” Journal of Sport Behavior 40.1 (2017): 87-107.

Kirsten Pike is an assistant professor in residence in the Communication Program at Northwestern University in Qatar. Her teaching and research interests include girls’ and children’s media culture, feminist media studies, and critical history/theory of television and film. Her research has appeared in Feminist Media Histories, Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication, Girlhood Studies, Mediated Girlhoods, and Reality Gendervision, among other venues. She is currently working on a manuscript called Girls’ Media in the Women’s Liberation Era: Girls Act and Talk Back (Routledge).

Global Fandom Jamboree: Hyo Jin Kim (South Korea)

illustrator/SF writer Park Moon Young.

My name is Hyo Jin Kim, an independent researcher in South Korea. My research interests center around two different topics. One is the science fiction (SF) fandom in South Korea—in particular, the fandom of the feminist SF subgenre. The other is representation in film and television that is subject to cultural bias (such as disability, race, and gender), especially that of Korean and Korean American females. 

Because of my dissertation, I've gained more interest in the SF fandom in South Korea. My dissertation originated from questioning the relationship between Korean science culture and policies and the Korean SF fandom. Since the year 2000, the Korean government has encouraged the growth of science culture through events and activities such as the Korean Science Festival and the Korea Science and Technology Fair (https://kofac.re.kr/eng/contents/whatwedo1-2.do). The primary purpose of science culture is to raise public interest by "building consensus and to share new forms of culture with the public" (https://kofac.re.kr/eng/contents/whatwedo1-2.do). According to the Korean government, "science culture" refers to being educated by the government rather than searching for and learning from the public's grassroots knowledge. From the beginning, the SF fandom was not included by the government, even though the SF fandom itself could be a part of science culture. Korean Doctor Who fans have shown that they learned some scientific information from the show. Fans of the TV show want to know more about it, including any relevant science. These fans learned and understood science by watching and loving Doctor Who. When you love and become a fan of the show, you know everything about it. The noticeable finding is that even information involving physics or other challenging scientific concepts becomes just another piece of information for fans to obtain. These Doctor Who fan activities illustrate the process of science communication and the development of science culture. The government did not recognize the SF fandom as a participant in science communication; however, Korean SF fans have already initiated science communication and culture through their fandom. Therefore, the government should pay more attention to the SF fandom. In collaboration with the grassroots SF fandom, the government could make public-friendly science policies or develop science culture. 

One remarkable discovery in my research is that participants see themselves as Doctor Who fans or Whovians but not SF fans. In South Korea, you are an enthusiast if you want to call yourself an SF fan (Sandvoss, 2005). Specific fans (e.g., Doctor Who's) and sf reading group members indicate themselves as sf fans with additional explanation. For example, one participant said s/he is a fan if you can call the person who likes to read and watch sf genre, but not that general impression of sf fan-an enthusiast. S/he felt s/he is not enough to be called an SF fan because some people still take SF fan as an SF expert. This case is unique compared to the US SF fandom. The definition of a fan may differ. The history of Korean SF might provide an insight into it. In 1907, the first SF was the translation of Jules Verne's Vingt Mille Lieues Sous Les Mers (1818) in Taegukhakbo, a journal for Korean students studying in Japan. In Japan, Korean students had introduced and translated the imported SF to enlighten the public and help the understanding of science. Since then, the SF genre in South Korea has expanded to offer not just entertainment but also another way to understand/learn science. In the 1970s and 1980s, SF writers wrote for kids and teens. (https://www.kbook-eng.or.kr/sub/trend.php?ptype=view&idx=462&page=&code=trend&total_searchkey=%EC%9D%B4%EC%A7%80%EC%9A%A9). The impression of SF among the Korean public is that it is for educating kids, teens, and professionals dealing with complex scientific knowledge. This perception of the genre persists. Therefore, SF fandom in South Korea has to deal with different layers of fan taxonomy. 

The growth of SF and feminist SF subgenre has accompanied South Korea. With the emergence of social issues such as Me Too (2006) and the Gangnam Station murder case (2016), another SF genre has been booming in South Korea: the subgenre of feminist SF. At the same time, the global climate crisis, along with the Covid-19 pandemic, has made people interested in SF. Nowadays, people feel they are living in the SF world. With this trend, SF-film, tv shows, books-is growing dramatically in South Korea. The characteristic of Korean SF indicates Korean sentiments and experiences without borrowing any Western-style worldview. Readers are familiar with Korean names, places, and social issues in Korean SF. Korean SF fans in South Korea no longer rely on translated Western SF works. 

According to Aladin (the Korean internet bookstore), young female readers have read sf frequently in twenty years; female SF readers in their 20s increased from 1.4% (1999–2009) to 12.6% (2010–2019) and those in their 30s from 11.1% to 18.2%. The reboot of feminism might have young female readers paying more attention to Korean feminist SF works. Young female readers are reading female writers' female narratives of feminist SF. Interestingly, in South Korea, most active writers are females, and they are young: 20s to 40s. As they grew up with feminism, it was part of their lives. Feminism is not a political/academic term to learn but a fight daily, a part of everyday life. Lefanu (1988) claimed, "Feminism questions a given order in political terms, while science fiction questions it in imaginative terms" (p. 100). Feminism is a hot social issue within different genders and generations in South Korea. Some critics analyze the popularity of SF from the growth of people/readers who want to change the world. People can find some different world in SF or imagine the answer to the 'what if' question of reality. 

In 2019 and 2022, I was part of two funded projects-gender equality living research project, "feminism discourses on feminist SF book club" (2019) and Covid-19, recorded with art, "Meet without meeting; 500 days' journey of reading feminist SF" (2022). These projects present how SF readers/fans read and reflect feminist SF in their lives. Each project demonstrates two different feminist SF book clubs with feminist SF reading lists. The first project, "feminism discourses on feminist SF book club," has the provided book list from another previous feminist SF book club. A current SF writer, translator, and Korean Science Fiction Association member made the book lists, including well-known feminist SF writers such as Ursula K. Le Guin, Margaret Atwood, Octavia Butler, James Tiptree Jr., Connie Willis, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Ann Leckie, and Joanna Russ. Several Korean SF writers include Bo-young Kim, Duna, Bora Chung, Yun I-hyeong, and Yoon yeokyung. Feminist SF book club members met once a week; they shared and discussed their reflections. Members also discussed various feminist issues, from past to present, and concerns of their everyday lives. This feminist SF book club continued for about two years. After finishing the given book list, members wanted to explore Korean feminist SF and chose to continue meeting each week to discuss recent Korean SF books. 

Another project, Covid 19, recorded with art, "Meet without meeting; 500 days' journey of reading feminist sf" (2022), was organized by sf x f (a feminism and SF project group). This project conducted surveys and focus groups through online meetings. sf x f organized the feminist SF book club and provided book lists focused on Korean feminist SF and feminist theory books. The difference from the first feminist SF book club is that sf x f chose specifically on Korean feminist SF. Once a month, members met online on the messaging platform Kakaotalk. The reflection themes were minorities, identity, human rights, disabilities, gender issues, sexual discrimination, sexual violence, subversive feminism, and eco-feminism. Members shared their reflections on feminist SF and experiences of daily life. Book club members shared their feelings during the meeting, laughed, cried, showed anger, felt sympathy, etc. Most members pointed out that in social situations in South Korea, there are very few places for females to speak up. They mentioned that this feminist SF book club provided an open, safe place for them to share their feelings and experiences. In addition, reading feminist SF made them experience different viewpoints of the world. After participating in the feminist SF book club, each member said they had more broad and diverse perspectives.

The reports from these two feminist SF book clubs show how SF readers/fans react to feminist SF. After finishing the book lists, book club members updated the list with Korean feminist sf. Members wanted to read and follow up with current Korean feminist SF books. Participants said they could read and understand Western feminist SF; however, they didn't get into it and felt emotionally distanced from translated feminist SF. Each book club member was closely and effortlessly engaging with Korean feminist SF. This reflection highlights the characteristics of Korean SF. Lee points out that the main feature of Korean SF is how it is "based on Korean sentiment and experiences separate from the Western-centered world view" (https://www.kbook-eng.or.kr/sub/trend.php?ptype=view&idx=462&page=&code=trend&total_searchkey=%EC%9D%B4%EC%A7%80%EC%9A%A9). This indicates the reaction of Korean readers/fans of SF and their lives and culture. Korean SF is establishing its fandom. Now is the time for in-depth research on the Korean SF fandom, especially in feminist SF, not Western studies. 

Sandvoss, C. (2005). Fans: The mirror of consumption. Malden, MA: Polity.

Lefanu, S. (1988). Feminism and Science Fiction. Bloonington, IN: Indiana University Press. 

Hyo Jin Kim is an independent researcher in South Korea. Research interests are in two different topics. One is the fandom of Science Fiction(SF) in South Korea, especially in the subgenre of feminist SF. The other is the representation of Korean/ Korean American female actors, disabled, race/gender, or any culturally biased issues on film and television. Hyo Jin Kim has been a juror of the Korean SF Award since 2019. The book,  #SF #Feminism #Herstory-Yoda genre critique series 02, and Critical reading of Bladerunner (with nine other co-authors) published in 2021. Hyo Jin Kim is currently working with Textreet(Genre critique group) and sf x f (sf and feminism project group).