Media and Communication Ph.D. Dissertations

Fanning While Female: Gatekeeping, Boundary Policing, and the Harassment of Women in the Star Wars Fandom

Date of Award

2023

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Department

Media and Communication

First Advisor

Lara Martin Lengel (Committee Chair)

Second Advisor

Lisa Handyside (Other)

Third Advisor

Ellen Gorsevski (Committee Member)

Fourth Advisor

Lisa Hanasono (Committee Member)

Abstract

Understanding both gender and fandom as performative can help to identify and describe ways in which fans and fandom become gendered, influences of patriarchy on fandom, and how gendered hierarchies form. With an eye toward performativity, this dissertation explores gendering of fans and fandom through social and cultural forces, pressures within fandom, and influences from texts around which fandoms are built. Additionally, the dissertation examines the ways fandom spaces themselves become gendered and sometimes contested. Using theoretical frameworks of Judith Butler’s theory of performativity, Laura Mulvey’s theory of the male gaze, and Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital, this dissertation explores the Star Wars fandom as a gendered and contested space through the following research questions: RQ1: How is language used in Star Wars fan communities to uphold and perpetuate patriarchy and its associated phenomena of sexism and misogyny? RQ2: How is language used in Star Wars fan communities to resist patriarchy and its associated phenomena of sexism and misogyny? The dissertation employs critical discourse analysis (CDA) to study textual interactions of Star Wars fans at the Jedi Council Forums. It follows James Paul Gee’s methodological approach to CDA, which highlights discourse in the interest of social justice, how sentence-level analysis can reveal writers’ use of language, and Gee’s seven building tasks for language use: Significance, practices, identities, relationships, politics, connections, and sign systems and knowledge. Because fandom is growing increasingly mainstream, this dissertation foregrounds women’s stories and experiences to explain ways in which women audiences interact with and participate in media they consume and argues for future research in a political economy approach to understanding women audience members in creation of media and its subsequent marketing. It highlights an intersectional approach that considers how factors such as race, age, and class operate in tandem with gender to uphold patriarchy and exacerbate sexism and misogyny. Key findings are, first, although not directed at other members, internalized sexism, misogyny, racism, ageism, and classism of some members as well as attempts to resist these problematic biases by other members. The second key finding reveals that moderation practices at the Jedi Council Forums operate to uphold and perpetuate patriarchy and its supporting systems of oppression.

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