The visible audience: Participation, community, and media fandom

Fans are often considered the most visible and identifiable of audiences, yet fans remain misunderstood, misrepresented, and largely silent in scholarship about these audiences. In this dissertation, I examine the fan audiences of the gimmick films of independent producer-director William Castle (1958--1964), The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), Twin Peaks (1990--1991), and Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1989--1999). Although the fans of these films and television programs are separated by time and media distinctions, they have in common many identifying characteristics that suggest how fans have and have not changed, from the face-to-face interaction via film fan clubs in the late 1950s through the 1970s to technologically-oriented participation through Internet newsgroups for particular television programs during the 1980s and 1990s. Rather than suggest that this project provides a historical examination of fan communities, however, I envision this dissertation as an attempt to move cultural studies of fan behavior closer to an understanding of the distinctions and similarities among media fan communities. This dissertation explores the individual characteristics of media fans and allows these fans to articulate---through their words, activities, and behavior---how they differ from one another.; In fan scholarship, little work exists that investigates both film and television fandom in order to make connections across media. This element of the dissertation seems significant particularly given the way in which the film and television industries have become closely linked through media mergers and conglomeration over the last four decades. By investigating the similarities and differences across film and television fan communities, this dissertation argues that individual media fan communities develop particular reception strategies that are characterized by active participation. Using genre theory as a model, I argue that William Castle's teenage fans, Rocky Horror fans, Twin Peaks fans, and Mystery Science Theater 3000 fans all belong to the same genre of fandom defined by dominant characteristics such as audience participation and community, but that each of these fan communities reveals variations within these categories that provide additional insight into the study of media fandom.