Romance Reading on the Internet
Nicole Pfannenstiel
Often referred to as bodice rippers, the Romance novel genre continues to be one of the bestselling book genres in the US. The genre is overlooked at best, and maligned at worst, especially by critics. As so many books continue to sell, how do romance readers find the books they want to read, and what do they do once they’ve read them. In the age of new media, romance readers no longer have to find their bookstore version of Dot (Radway), they can now scour the internet to find a community that meets their romance reading needs. Looking specifically at a GoodReads (goodreads.com) Romance reading community, this paper will discuss how moderators and participants create and sustain community within the subgroup to encourage connections through internet technology. To discuss how GoodReads romance readers simultaneously try to find satisfying books and rescue a genre, current theories of audience receptions (Mailloux, Bratich and Jenkins) will be used to discuss the ways readers of romance approach the texts and discuss the texts. Within this discussion, participants and moderators inhabit contested space simply based on the genre they choose to read. The ways participants reconcile their participation in that space creates complex interactions that ultimately deal with the love of a heroine and hero. The ways participants discuss romance novels, their reading of romance novels, and their reception of romance novels will be discussed as the key elements that create and sustain a complex virtual community on GoodReads.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Thursday, November 11, 2010
literacy examples
for a paper i'm re-writing, trying to provide more concrete examples of academic literacy and the way it presumes understanding of how to 'act' literate. that theoretical discussion goes first, more new media examples will go after this section. hopefully it sounds good.
Seeing literacy as tied to action as well as reading and writing is important. My mom tells a story of eating breakfast with an Uncle. He sat down at the restaurant, picked up the menu, appeared to peruse it. He then ordered the same meal as someone else at the table, which did not seem odd. It wasn’t until a few days later that she learned he was illiterate. Instead of drawing attention to his inability to read the menu to select a meal, he simply followed the traditional actions, then ordered the same meal as someone else. My mom had no idea he was illiterate.
This example doesn’t help with freshmen college students, who should be more literate. I have a friend who completed an online course recently. The course consisted of reading text books, notes provided by the professor, completing online quizzes, and then two major exams. The professor asked a lengthy (expecting a 5 page response) quiz question, then re-asked the same question on the exam. Every student who re-used their quiz answer received a zero. At no time during the semester were academic integrity issues discussed, the professor assumed students understood self-plagiarism, so felt it was fair to reuse a test question. In this case, students became victim of the problem with how academic integrity is approached in college classes today. Instead of devoting online space to discussing academic integrity, the professor assumes students are aware, and then punishes students by giving them zero’s when they exhibit the wrong behavior. There is no way for students to simply order what someone else is, and pretend to read a menu to pass the literacy test in academia. Instead, they must always present the correct identity when displaying their literacy surrounding academic integrity at the college level.
Seeing literacy as tied to action as well as reading and writing is important. My mom tells a story of eating breakfast with an Uncle. He sat down at the restaurant, picked up the menu, appeared to peruse it. He then ordered the same meal as someone else at the table, which did not seem odd. It wasn’t until a few days later that she learned he was illiterate. Instead of drawing attention to his inability to read the menu to select a meal, he simply followed the traditional actions, then ordered the same meal as someone else. My mom had no idea he was illiterate.
This example doesn’t help with freshmen college students, who should be more literate. I have a friend who completed an online course recently. The course consisted of reading text books, notes provided by the professor, completing online quizzes, and then two major exams. The professor asked a lengthy (expecting a 5 page response) quiz question, then re-asked the same question on the exam. Every student who re-used their quiz answer received a zero. At no time during the semester were academic integrity issues discussed, the professor assumed students understood self-plagiarism, so felt it was fair to reuse a test question. In this case, students became victim of the problem with how academic integrity is approached in college classes today. Instead of devoting online space to discussing academic integrity, the professor assumes students are aware, and then punishes students by giving them zero’s when they exhibit the wrong behavior. There is no way for students to simply order what someone else is, and pretend to read a menu to pass the literacy test in academia. Instead, they must always present the correct identity when displaying their literacy surrounding academic integrity at the college level.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
rewriting . . . . again
new focus . . . hopefully it makes sense
To better understand how fans of videogames participate in play, two online game fan communities will be discussed as literate spaces that provide additional space for fans to explore game play.
To better understand how fans of videogames participate in play, two online game fan communities will be discussed as literate spaces that provide additional space for fans to explore game play.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
cooties . . thats right it all started with cooties
Today I went to an organic farmer’s market on campus, part of the green initiative at ASU. While there my friend and I purchased a tamale boat to share. When we mentioned we would be sharing, the seller offered to split it for us. We declined saying we don’t have cooties, we’ll be fine. At this point it became apparent that the seller was not a native English speaker because he became confused by the term ‘cooties’ thinking we were saying ‘cuties.’ He then said that was a new word, what did it mean. So there the two of us stood trying to explain cooties. We said it’s like an imaginary germ, often seen between five year old girls and five year old boys. This confused him even more, so he asked his young assistant to explain it to him. She struggled just as much, also saying it’s a way of referring to germs.
With a word like cooties, the word looses all meaning out of context. To children on the playground, the word has HUGE significance. To non-native English speakers communicating with adult native English speakers, the word seems out of context, out of place, and just confusing. Idioms, sayings, quotes, all have the same contextual tie, and when used out of context or with individuals who can’t make the connection back to a previous context the terms lose all meaning. This is one of those cases where our brains process so much information in such a short period of time that we never have to consider context when placing word definitions. We run through all the possibilities subconsciously and adjust our definitions of words while the speaker continues to add context through language.
With a word like cooties, the word looses all meaning out of context. To children on the playground, the word has HUGE significance. To non-native English speakers communicating with adult native English speakers, the word seems out of context, out of place, and just confusing. Idioms, sayings, quotes, all have the same contextual tie, and when used out of context or with individuals who can’t make the connection back to a previous context the terms lose all meaning. This is one of those cases where our brains process so much information in such a short period of time that we never have to consider context when placing word definitions. We run through all the possibilities subconsciously and adjust our definitions of words while the speaker continues to add context through language.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
virtual reality
My problem with virtual reality, and movement in 3 dimensional space is the loss of game and play we experience when the space is moved more toward reality. The point and purpose of games is the play aspect. Even when playing dominoes or scrabble there is play at work, we know we’re playing a game, with rules that don’t match real life. Even in games that involve monetary bets like poker and blackjack that affect reality, the moment of betting and gaming is still play. Until we’ve won big or lost big, the actual cards represent play. The after effects are the reality.
So when we discuss virtual reality games that would require a player to move to model the movements into the game world, real life physicality becomes an issue. With the new Tony Hawk game where a player uses a skateboard type remote control to play, the player must learn to make the skateboard movements on the remote control, but they must be more physically fit and capable than a player with a traditional console controller. Instead of allowing the suspension of disbelief like a skateboard game does (the gamer controlling the action does n ot need to be able to complete any of the actions) a more based on real life controller requires the player to know more about actual, real life skateboarding. We’ve begun to move game space toward reality, like the poker player who loses their life savings. The virtual reality game space no longer allows for suspension of disbelief because the player must be able to make all motions very similar to how they would in real life. Therefore, an important aspect of play is lost in the physicality of the game design.
So when we discuss virtual reality games that would require a player to move to model the movements into the game world, real life physicality becomes an issue. With the new Tony Hawk game where a player uses a skateboard type remote control to play, the player must learn to make the skateboard movements on the remote control, but they must be more physically fit and capable than a player with a traditional console controller. Instead of allowing the suspension of disbelief like a skateboard game does (the gamer controlling the action does n ot need to be able to complete any of the actions) a more based on real life controller requires the player to know more about actual, real life skateboarding. We’ve begun to move game space toward reality, like the poker player who loses their life savings. The virtual reality game space no longer allows for suspension of disbelief because the player must be able to make all motions very similar to how they would in real life. Therefore, an important aspect of play is lost in the physicality of the game design.
Monday, August 23, 2010
ahhhh football
school is back in session for college students. YAY!!!! so this morning we had a discussion about culture, how to define culture, what makes up culture, how it gains power. all i asked was "what is culture" and early in the morning my students came up with great examples of how to provide examples and ideas about what makes up and defines culture. a sometimes difficult task. one of the examples that really struck home was sports. americans are one of the only countries who love football, and have all sorts of ideas, practices, identities, beliefs, and values surrounding sports. my students were able to enumerate many of these things, and how they felt about them. i then brought up videogames, of course. as my husband plays madden, he often complains about the lack of fan presence at milehigh stadium whenever there is weather. denver and green bay are well known for their fandom, their sold out stadiums for decades, their love of their teams. however, they are represented completely differently in the game. for a true fan, without recognizing the slight against their form of fandom, they are offended by how they are represented in the game. the complaints voiced by my husband are legitimate concerns about how a game is representing the fans of a team he loves. how could a videogame franchise so ingrained in game play botch up fandom so bad????
ahhhhh romance, its totally research
Flowers from the Storm by Laura KinsaleMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
really solid heorine and hero, madness and religion issues. just a great story!
View all my reviews
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