Henry Jenkins on The Future of Fandom and Media Consumption

Fan culture has always been something that has interested me, which was why I decided to listen to an episode the podcast 'Fandom made me' featuring Henry Jenkins speaking on The Future of Fandom and Media Consumption. After being introduced to listeners as the 'father of fandom studies', Jenkins very swiftly denies the position of being a patriarch in what he refers to as a feminist field. For the most part, he is correct in this idea. Many fan spaces in terms of media consumption have always been female-dominated, which has led to many dismissive ideas about not only these women, but also the certain types of music and film they tend to engage with. Jenkins, however, continually emphasises the importance of fans for the media industry; after all, without consumers there would be no room for any products. He speaks about how social the act of media consumption has become for everybody in more recent years with the rise of platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. The ability of audiences to discuss the products in their cultural zeitgeist among others so easily has transformed the modern media landscape to become more interactive than ever before. Jenkins also touches on the potential threat of AI, or in his eyes the lack thereof. He does recognise why some creatives may feel concerned, although he claims that he does not see it as posing any major risks for the likes of script writers, as it simply does not possess the same human expression which we as consumers value so deeply. Jenkins ends the episode by speaking on transcultural fandom studies, more specifically how he believes this type of fandom helps lead to greater appreciation of international cultures between people. Using the example of popular Japanese media such as various anime TV shows, Jenkins speaks on how this has now become so widespread that almost anyone across the world can recognise the style. I found the podcast episode to be very engaging, as Jenkins seems to have a very solid grasp on not only what fandom has been for years, but what it is becoming in our hyper-connected world. It was interesting to hear a theorist we study speak about more modern products, such as the cultural phenomenon of Summer 2023 'Barbenheimer', and how fandom played a major role in that.

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