I constructed a Tumblr over a couple of days this week and used it as a basic commentary for the sorts of texts that pop culture claims as its’ own. It is based on a couple of the topics that I talked about with the young people I interviewed for an earlier post I did for this blog, as well as a lot of informal conversation and my own wanderings around the internet. I began broadly sketching out a few ideas in this mind map:
I could have kept going, but this seemed like enough.
I didn’t cover all of the topics here, and some of the topics in the blog are not mentioned here – I’ve really just put this up for the sake of notarizing the process properly. I found myself taking a fair bit of time figuring out what I was going to include in the Tumblr, as I got caught up in thinking about the sorts of concepts that the texts represented, and I wanted good examples. It wasn’t enough to put in a really basic example of cosplay or a single Fail vid – I really found myself conflicted about the content that was on there once or twice. I also didn’t just want to put stuff up there without an explanation, hence the commentary that probably doesn’t stay on topic too well.
There was also an interesting conflict between ‘popular culture’ and ‘mainstream’ culture – music was a really good example of this. Whilst ‘Top 40 stuff’ was mentioned as being the most popular across the board, not many of the people I spoke too really enjoyed the texts (songs) involved with it. It occurred to me that with the proliferation of technology and ease of access to things like fandoms and niche communities, what was adopted by the majority might not be the only thing that was considered popular.
I hope the Tumblr proves to be an interesting/useful/funny introduction to what I thought were a few of the main aspects of pop culture. I tried including enough variety to demonstrate the pervasive nature of the concept and hope that shows too.
In my next post, I will be covering more on gaming and gamification, as this is something that I’ve already researched in other areas of my academic life.
Bodies' QUT Blog of TEXT 
Welcome to Tumblr! while I use Tumblr I’ve never really had a look of it outside the various fandoms I’ve been involved in. I like it because I can access the content I want to reblog and share with other people who share the same interests as me. Tumblr is a place where I can ‘fangirl’ with other fangirls without being judged as crazy. Sure, there are things like Hunger Games and Harry Potter on my dashboard but there are other outlets to express membership of that fandom (Harry Potter Alliance, trivia nights, movie nights, book groups etc) – people interested in things that don’t have those means of connectivity need spaces like Tumblr to meet up.
Thanks for the welcome! I’ve done a couple of other blogs on it before, but this is the first ‘legit’ one I’ve done. It’s got a wide and bizarre scape of personalities and content in there, that’s for sure. Is it really that much of a concern to be judged as crazy for you, do you think? I was under the impression we’d almost reached saturation point as far as Harry had gone. Now I’ve got visions of the lonely Potterphile out in the middle of nowhere, browsing potterheads.tumblr and shyly reblogging stuff for a fix. Thanks for the comment!
Cool Tumblr post, I found myself giggling and chuckling to myself a number of times. I particularly love the Oatmeal webcomic and Backstreet Boys video. Your mind map was also an interesting read and I liked how you contextualised your posts on Tumblr to get an in-depth view of the process and ideas behind your posts. I’d even say that Tumblr was a better choice than Pinterest to use as I believe it is more popular with young people these days. Thanks!
OMG! Mind maps are appearing everywhere! 😛 You really looked in depth at the process of Tumblr Bodie, it was enlightening. I agree with Annette, Tumblr probably was a more appropriate “youth” choice compared to Pinterest which seems to me to be full of women pinning wedding ideas… Or in my case, cats and gardening…
Hehe. Cats and gardening will never get old. I’m glad you found it enlightening. See my reply to Annette about what I think of mind maps. Sometimes I wonder if I have too much time to devote to thinking about this sort of stuff. You haven’t engaged with pop culture until you’ve asked yourself ‘Do kids really like My Little Pony as much as they seem to?’
I’m glad someone found it amusing – it started getting a bit dry so I tried to keep it interesting! I love a good mind mapping – I used them a lot in my undergrad and they’re a great way to get down info whilst letting your mind wander. I have to admit I used Tumblr because Pinterest seemed a bit ‘girly’ for me, and I have a lot more familiarity with the ecosystem in Tumblr.