My Last Assignment Was Badass and About Geeky Shit!

On 05/30/2014 at 11:30 PM by Blake Turner

So, this was the question:

You may choose ONE of the following three topics.

1. A theme of this unit is the conflict between creativity and didacticism which manifests itself in much media for young people. Chose two texts that demonstrate a particular ‘message’ and assess how that message is delivered, taking into account the way that visual and narrative elements work to reinforce particular ideas or ideologies.

2. If transformation is a dominant idea in media for tweens and teens, what does this suggest about how adolescence is represented in film or television for those age groups? Discuss, relating to at least two television programs or films aimed at the tween/teen market.

3. Fandom. What do children’s or adolescents’ media products offer adult viewers/purchasers? Consider in relation to the ideas of ‘kidult’ and ‘adult’, and fan subculture, using as a case study one example of adult fan culture.

Obviously, I chose the one in bold haha.

This was our required readings for the sections it covered:

Week 10. Coming of Age and Playing Games

Coming of Age and Playing GamesBook
Week 10 Study GuideFile
Discussing Teens: Coming of Age and Playing GamesForum
RESOURCES
Readings
Reading. Newman: Superplay , sequence breaking and speedrunningURL
Generation 'Like'URL
Viewings
The Wizards of Waverley Place WebsiteURL
MerlinURL
Good Game WebsiteURL
Halo WebsiteURL
Halo Parody: Red vs BlueURL
Age of Empires III WebsiteURL
Mario Kart WebsiteURL
Game Playing Statistics 2011URL
Charmed WebsiteURL
DISCUSSION
Lecture Powerpoint: Coming of Age and Playing GamesFile 118.6KB

AND

Week 11. Teens, Kidults, and Irony

Teens, Kidults and IronyBook
Week 11 Study Guide and Topic NotesFile
Week 11 Powerpoint SlidesFile 1.2MB
Lecture Powerpoint-2012File
2012 Lecture SlidesFile
RESOURCES
Reading. Crawford Adult Responsibility in Insecure TimesURL
Reading. Schott and Burn Fan-Art as a Function of Agency in Oddworld Fan-CultureFile
Banet-Weiser: Is Nick for Kids ? Irony , Camp and Animation in the Nickelodeon BrandURL
Reading. 'Community' vs 'Big Bang Theory'URL
Additional Reading: Venetia Robertson: Of Ponies and men: My Little Pony: Frienship is Magic and the Brony fandomFile 2.5MB
Pony CreatorURL
Viewing. Brony DocumentaryURL
Oddworld websiteURL
The Big Bang Theory websiteURL
Dr Who websiteURL
The Hunger Games websiteURL
The Twilight Saga websiteURL
DISCUSSION
Discussing Kidults and Fandoms

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Look guys. This assignment was straight up made for me. I fucking loved it. If you're wondering what my unit was: COMM315/515 Children's Media

KnightDriver

05/31/2014 at 03:47 AM

Ha ha. "kidult" My new word of the week. I'm going to use it in every situation I can think of.

Super Step Contributing Writer

05/31/2014 at 04:54 AM

Oddly enough, I listened to an overlong podcast about bronies yesterday. The podcast is called Super Tool Shed and it's run by Bennett the Sage and his ... producer I think? friend Neer. That's the first "fandom" I thought of when I read "kidult." I watched an episode on Netflix yesterday where the one pony freaks out about people not coming to her after-birthday birthday party cause it was rated the best episode to start someone out with and ... I don't get it. Gonna stick to just watching Breaking Bad, which I plan to marathon the rest of as soon as I can. I'm on I think episode 3 or 4 of season 2?

Alex-C25

05/31/2014 at 05:53 AM

As a very mild fan (not to Brony levels), I would say it's better to start from the very beginning.

05/31/2014 at 05:52 AM

Everything there is also made for me. Maybe when I start studying anthropology next year, I can use geek themes.

Matt Snee Staff Writer

05/31/2014 at 09:04 AM

Is that gonna be your major?

05/31/2014 at 09:17 AM

No idea :P

PixlBit