Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University English Dissertations Department of English 12-2009 Toward a Rhetoric of Scholar-Fandom Tanya R. Cochran Georgia State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/english_diss Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Cochran, Tanya R., "Toward a Rhetoric of Scholar-Fandom." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2009. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/english_diss/51 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of English at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in English Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. TOWARD A RHETORIC OF SCHOLAR-FANDOM by TANYA R. COCHRAN Under the Direction of Lynée Lewis Gaillet ABSTRACT Individuals who consider themselves both scholars and fans represent not only a subculture of fandom but also a subculture of academia. These liminal figures seem suspicious to many of their colleagues, yet they are particularly positioned not only to be conduits to engaged learning for students but also to transform the academy by chipping away at the stereotypes that support the symbolic walls of the Ivory Tower. Because they are growing in number and gaining influence in academia, the scholar-fans of the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Buffy) and other texts by creator Joss Whedon are one focus of this dissertation. Though Buffy academics or Whedon scholars are not the only ones of their kind (e.g., academic- fan communities have cropped up around The Simpsons, The Matrix Trilogy, and the Harry Potter franchise), they have produced more literature and are more organized than any other academic-fan community. I approach all of my subjects—fandom, academia, fan-scholars, and scholar-fans—from a multidisciplinary perspective, employing various methodologies, including autoethnography and narrative inquiry. Taking several viewpoints and using mixed methods best allows me to begin identifying and articulating a rhetoric of scholar-fandom. Ultimately, I claim that Whedon academic-fans employ a discourse marked by intimacy, community, reciprocity, and transformation. In other words, the rhetoric of Whedon scholar- fandom promotes an epistemology—a way of knowing—that in Parker J. Palmer’s paradigm is personal, communal, reciprocal, and transformational. INDEX WORDS: Aca-fan, Academic-fan, Angel (television series), Astonishing X-Men (comic book series), Autoethnography, Browncoats, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (television series), Composition, Discourse, Dollhouse (television series), Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog (web series), English department, Fandom, Fans (persons), Fan-scholar, Firefly (television series), Fray (graphic novel), Gospel epistemology, Ivory Tower, Joss Whedon, Narrative inquiry, Parker J. Palmer, Popular culture, Rhetoric, Scholar-fan, Scholar-fandom, Scholardom, Serenity (motion picture), Writing centers TOWARD A RHETORIC OF SCHOLAR-FANDOM by TANYA R. COCHRAN A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University 2009 Copyright by Tanya Renee Cochran 2009 TOWARD A RHETORIC OF SCHOLAR-FANDOM by TANYA R. COCHRAN Committee Chair: Lynée Lewis Gaillet Committee: Baotong Gu Mary Hocks Electronic Version Approved: November 9, 2009 Office of Graduate Studies College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University December 2009 iv DEDICATION In memory of my dad, the other Dr. Cochran v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I could not have completed this dissertation without the encouragement and feedback of many people, some of whom I have never even met face-to-face. First, I have been profoundly shaped by three mentors and friends: my undergraduate English professor Helen Godfrey Pyke of Southern Adventist University, who set me on the path of pursuing a degree in composition and rhetoric; Eileen Meagher, my graduate advisor at the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga, who first introduced me to the study of popular culture; and my doctoral advisor at Georgia State University, Lynée Lewis Gaillet, who was willing to work with me on this project from a great physical distance and not only gave helpful, timely responses to my drafts but also supported me emotionally—during phone conversations, through Christmas cards, and in the lobbies of conference hotels. Also to the other members of my dissertation committee Mary Hocks and Baotong Gu, I give deep gratitude for their careful and constructive feedback on my final draft. Next, I was privileged to have the very astute criticism of several groups of writers: Mike Mennard, Laura Camacho, Leslie Camacho, and Ben Yancer—all who participated in the earliest stages of my writing—and my friends and colleagues Mark Robison and Ed Allen, without whom I would still be writing rather than graduating. Thank you for challenging and guiding me, fellow writers! Often my copresenter at many writing center conferences as well as a sometimes coauthor, my friend Beth Godbee spent many hours listening to both my writing woes and triumphs and responding to my drafts; she is an invaluable composing partner and an insightful questioner. In the summer of 2009, I found instruction and companionship at the University of Oklahoma-Norman’s Camp Completion, the catalyst I needed to reach the home stretch—thanks to Michele Eodice, Kami Day, writing consultants, and cohorts. For sustaining vi me through much stress and anxiety, my life coaches Marsha Bartulec and Debbie Forshee- Sweeney as well as my massage therapist Donna Williams deserve praise and recognition. To my community of Whedon scholars—particularly Meghan Winchell for her comments and encouragement—I hope all of you find yourselves represented well in these pages. I value the opportunity to learn from you as well as to study alongside you. My appreciation also must go to Union College, who employed me before I was finished with this work, and especially to the librarians in the Rose Crandall Memorial Library; interlibrary loan made my research manageable even though I had many other professional duties. To all of my close friends and colleagues in the Division of Humanities at Union College—especially Jill Morstad for reading a final draft—and my chosen family at New Creation Community: you are shiny! Penultimate gratitude goes to Joss Whedon, the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and many other rich texts, who unawares has made me a better scholar and teacher, a better human being, and a better Christian. And finally, my deepest thanks and affection I give to my immediate family—my mother Rita V. Cochran, my sister Cynthia M. Cochran, and Jeff Roth—who have always already loved me, supported and encouraged me, and cheered me on. This is for all of us. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS v LIST OF FIGURES viii 1 PROLOGUE: THUS BEGINNETH THE LESSON 1 2 SLAYING PUPILS, SIRING STUDENTS: COMPOSITION BEFRIENDS BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER 21 3 FANDOM: ETYMOLOGY AND RHETORICAL FRAMEWORKS 47 4 SCHOLARDOM: HISTORY AND RHETORICAL FRAMEWORKS 80 5 FAN-SCHOLARS AND SCHOLAR-FANS: LIFE IN THE SHADOWLANDS 110 6 SCHOLAR-FANDOM AT WORK AND (IN) PLAY: THE CASE OF WHEDON STUDIES 142 7 EPILOGUE: SCHOLARLY HYBRIDITY, A BALM AND TINCTURE 202 WORKS CITED 213 APPENDICES 234 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 6.1 Academic Journal Articles Published on Whedon Texts, 1999-2008 149 1 Chapter One PROLOGUE: THUS BEGINNETH THE LESSON ‚The starting point of critical elaboration is the consciousness of what one really is, and is ‘knowing thyself’ as a product of the historical process to date which has deposited in you an infinity of traces, without leaving an inventory. The first thing to do is to make such an inventory.‛ ---Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks ‚The academy keeps refusing to tell me about my self.‛ ---Scott Bukatman, ‚X-Bodies‛ ‚It may be impossible to avoid writing academically without providing a narrative shape to one’s ‘theoretical’ account (meaning, nonjudgmentally, that all theories are also stories).‛ ---Matt Hills, Fan Cultures I am here at the beginning, yet I find myself at the end, writing and refining this introduction, the final act before the curtain closes on my doctoral performance. I take my bow with the above epigraphs in my ear and in my mind’s eye—knowing myself a little better, despite and because of the academy, and in the following pages sharing the story of how I came to the spot on this, life’s stage. It is a story that clings to and pulls away from my discipline and its genres, that praises and chastises academia, that accepts and questions the private and the public Self. It is the story of a whole person with reasons and emotions, an objective and subjective pose, a story that will continue to say what it, what she has to say. 2 I am Woman, I am Christian, I am Fan, I am Scholar. I am Story. * * * I’m sitting in Beth and Ed’s den filling out a worksheet. Not a worksheet for school or work. A worksheet for me. A personal inventory of sorts. I read the first question: ‚What are your favorite stories in the world—movies and books?‛ I wonder how I can possibly think of just a few. Across the room, Beth sighs; how can she think of even one, she wants to know? I scribble quickly, filling more than the allotted eight spaces: ‚The Chronicles of Narnia, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The X-Files, Angel, Firefly, The Lord of the Rings, The Matrix, Strictly Ballroom, Cinema Paradiso, Kolya,‛ and, not being able to choose just one of them, ‚any book by Jane Austen.‛ Easy enough. With more time, I might be able to fill an entire page with favorites. Next question: ‚What are your favorite stories in the Bible?‛ The question doesn’t surprise me; I’m sitting among six friends who share my same desire: to know God more intimately and, thus, to know myself.