When I started graduate school in the Popular Culture Studies MA program, I knew it would be different. When I took classes outside of Popular Culture, or students from outside programs would take a Popular Culture class, I could see there was a difference. But I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
That followed me into my American Culture Studies PhD program. Myself and a friend who has a MA in Popular Culture in all but name would consistently bring up how Popular Culture would approach this (insert here). Some professors liked it. It drove others nuts. Probably because it seemed like we weren’t trying to do thing the ACS way. But other students were doing it the Literature way or the Ethnic Studies way without any problem. Then again, American (Culture) Studies does have its roots in Literary Studies and History, with Ethnic Studies being a branch off of it.
Today, I have a better idea of why my approach to scholarship is going to be different, and possibly more challenging for me, than many others. I read a short editorial in the October 2020 issue of The Journal of Popular Culture that talked about a roundtable panel at the Midwest PCA conference. They talked about the field of Popular Culture Studies. Two sentences really grabbed my attention:
Theory is chosen to illuminate the artifact, rather than vice versa. A work of popular culture scholarship begins with the artifact, whether it is a television show, a song, a celebrity, a movie, a performance, a consumer object, a comic book, or a romance novel.
“Redefining Popular Culture After Ray Browne Roundtable” by Ann Larabee in The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 53, No. 5.
That is where my scholarship always starts. The X-Men. Hamilton. Ratatouille: A TikTok Musical. Bitch Planet. Superheroes with disabilities. Adam Lambert. I find the artifact and then I use theory to analyze it, to explain it, to explore why people connect with it. It’s hard to explain that to scholars who aren’t familiar with the BGSU approach to Popular Culture studies. Now that I know what I do, I can work on explaining it. A real “ah-ha” moment!
Deviate from the Norm 