Hill argues that literary/television producers can't manufacture a cult folllowing -only the fans can do that. The reason for this is that a cult following is the product of the beliefs and behaviors of the fan who build a culture around their favorite stories. You can't tell fans to incorporate aspects of television into their daily lives. That is a decision on the fans can make.
The rise of a cult following can be objectively quantified by how fans express their appreciation and involvment for their favorite shows. Some commone examples of this include “appreciation societies” where likeminded individuals congregate (sometimes virtually on the internet and sometimes physically at confrences), online discussions, purchasing/creating memorobelia/merchandise, the creation of fan-fiction and real world role playing where fans dress up and act like their favorite characters.
While the rise of cult followings aren't exclusively dependent on technology such as the internet, home computers and hand held cameras, they have certainly helped likeminded individuals express/share their appreciation for their favorite television shows. As television producers continue to better understand their cult followings I expect to see programming in the future that allows fans to vote on how they want their series to progress similar to how fans of reality TV can “call in” and vote characters out.
Hills, M. (2004). Defining Cult TV; Texts,
Inter-texts and Fan Audiences, The
Television Studies Reader, in R. C. Allen
& A. Hill. (p.517-520) London and New York:
Routledge.
I agree, fanfiction and online discussions etc have really helped form cult TV. these days it would almost not be cult TV without the fans and there computers and blogs and websites, fansfictions, discussiona and youtube videos. This helps the fans express their own personal 'loves' for the shows and can show the world how big a televsions show. It also helps the showw-makers. Fans giving ideas about the show to the writers etc. Cult TV is now so much broader. It started with Star trek and docotr who, but shpows like Buffy have really made it what it is today.. Its own little community of cult fans :) I really like how you wrote this, very well written.
ReplyDeleteA good summary of Hill (2004), but it would have been interesting if you had taken this further. Hill is a bit dated in terms of his discussion on fan practices- so you could have developed this discussion further by describing contemporary fan practices and even looking at one or two existing fan sites and making comments on these.
ReplyDeleteNice comment by Danni
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