Media Theory Revision Guide
My Revision
Essential Film!
Humans
Textual poaching and Humans
Jenkins
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Jenkins also tells us that fan-based activity can also be used for the purpose of identity exploration.
He calls attention to the process of ‘textual poaching’, for example, wherein audiences refashion narrative content in order to explore aspects of identity that aren’t readily foregrounded in source storylines.
Slash (’/’) fanfiction, for example, reinvents heterosexual lead characters, repositioning them within fanfics that foreground story leads within more gender-fluid narratives or softer versions of masculinity.
Jenkins also draws attention to the way that fan communities provide support for erstwhile writers who use source texts as a means to experiment with their identities.
A trawl of fanfiction.net, for example, reveals a limited number of fanfics that use Humans as a source text, with most writers echoing the Maddie/Leo heteronometaive storyline cultivated in season three.
Fan reworkings of Mattie/Leo, however, are mostly told from Mattie’s perspective, providing female audiences with a means to reclaim the story from a female perspective, with story endings usually reinforcing a less macho version of the screen version of Leo.
Participatory culture
The use of digital technologies by groups or individuals to create social change. The Harry Potter Alliance, for example, are an online community that promotes global social justice via online activism.
Media terminology used
Textual poaching
The use of media products by audiences for purposes that weren't originally intended by their makers: YouTube remixes or fan parody videos, for example.
Web 2.0
Jenkins refers to Web 2.0 as the commercial activities of the internet - web marketing, for example.