Interview

For my in class interview I interviewed Faith about Glee. She's actually a fan of the show, so some of her quotes will be useful for my paper. She had great opinions on the show and showed an interest in my questions. Below are two quotes that I hope to use in my paper.

"It's a show about the underdog."
"Glee shows that everyone is valuable no matter who they are."

A cultural artifact related to the Glee fandom is the slushie. Every Glee fan knows that the slushie is a key part of the show and even a big part of the fandom. When most fans think of Glee they think of slushies, since every character on the show has been slushied at least once, if not more than once. It represents the fact that the Glee members themselves are outcasts, since they get slushies in the face and the fans can relate to that, being an outcast. They feel like the characters are real people just like them. All Glee fans can find at least one character they can relate to.

Humanities Symposium

One of the lectures I went to during the humanities symposium was "Truth In 140 Characters?" which focused on social media's influence on the way we receive our news. It focused on how we use Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, and other social media outlets to receive our news. 2 students were on the panel and they discussed how due to social media they found out about the soccer coach scandal that occurred last year. Once that was brought up, the whole conversation seemed to shift to the scandal and not exactly about what the lecture was truly meant to be about, which kind of bummed me out. While the lecture was informative had it stayed on topic, like I wish it would have, it would have been a so much better lecture and by far more informative.

One thing I did take away was that with social media we are able to get news and information much faster than we have in years past. Almost instantly we are able to find out what's going on anywhere and everywhere in the world. We can use our computers, smart phones, etc. and we have access to all sorts of news at our fingertips. Without social media, news would take awhile to get out and wouldn't travel as fast.

When I went in the Beaman to observe the other day for class I noticed one key element, that most everyone kept to themselves. Everyone was sitting at a table alone or maybe with one other person, but they didn't really communicate with each other. Everyone kept to themselves, but on occasion they would see someone they knew and they might tell them hi, but it would throw everyone else off because someone was talking in such a quiet area. It was almost like we were in the library with how quiet everyone seemed to be. It was like when someone talked out among everyone that it was such a shock to everyone that it confused them. It seems to be the social norm in the early hours to be quiet in the Beaman, but as the day goes on I noticed people become more talkative and social. It all comes down to whoever is in there and what is already going on. People seem to mimic what everyone else is doing so that they can conform to what's going on.

What surprised me? It surprised me how much people really kept to themselves. No one really seemed to mix with each other unless they knew the person pretty well.

What intrigued me? That not too many students were in the Beaman. I know it was during a class time but I thought it would be full of more people. It seemed like more people were in the gym working out, than out in the lobby studying.

What disturbed me? Nothing disturbed me. Everything was normal and fine and nothing was out of place.

Topic ideas

I've come up with the following ideas for my project, all dealing with Internet fandoms/fans.

- Glee fans, otherwise known as Gleeks. I'm a fan of the show and am always amazed at how dedicated people are towards the show and what they come up with. Glee fans are a special fan all their own and have their own culture and sometimes even their own language.

- Justin Bieber fans, otherwise known as Beliebers. While I realize, I am kind of old to like Justin Bieber, I do. His music is fun, upbeat, and all around positive. His fans have been compared to the kinds of fans The Beatles had. It would be interesting to look more into his fans, as a culture, and what exactly makes them Beliebers.

- Harry Potter fans, otherwise known as Potterheads. While I'm not as big of a fan of Harry Potter, as I am the two above, I do have an interest in this topic. It's so interesting to see people so into a book and now a movie series, that they are so dedicated to. It'd be interesting to research how the fanbase grew/spread throughout the book series and even moreso when the movies came out.