Author: CarrieLynn D. Reinhard

  • The Pop Culture Lens on Frank Sinatra

    The Pop Culture Lens on Frank Sinatra

    In the twenty-eighth episode of The Pop Culture Lens podcast, Christopher Olson and I welcome back friend of the podcast and unofficial fourth co-host Clelia Sweeney to discuss the classic iconography of Frank Sinatra. In this episode, the conversation considers how Sinatra’s identity changed through the various stages of his career, but also how those changes…

  • Identification with Favorite Media Personae

    Identification with Favorite Media Personae

    I presented this study at my first International Communication Association conference in May 2005. It was the first major study I did by myself in graduate school. I remember making these slides to show on a projector — there was no PowerPoint! I should probably revisit it.  Identification with Favorite Media Personae: A phenomenologically-informed conceptualization of…

  • The Pop Culture Lens on Yojimbo (1961)

    The Pop Culture Lens on Yojimbo (1961)

    In the twenty-seventh episode of The Pop Culture Lens podcast, Christopher Olson and I welcome back friend of the podcast Joe Belfeuil to discuss Akira Kurosawa’s samurai classic Yojimbo (1961). In this episode, the conversation focuses on the film’s position as a transnational and transcultural pop culture text that acts as a link in a…

  • A Subject by Choice: The Agency of Fans

    I wrote this reflection paper back in 2007 to consider how theories about subjectivation occurs in fandom. Which is to say, how fans of something willingly become identified with that thing they are a fan of. Subjectivation would argue that people passively become something through external ideological forces — that they have no say in…

  • Thoughts on Sex in FanFic

    Written in October of 2005… I started researching fan fiction, the creation of stories centered on characters or storylines of preexisting media texts, after I came upon a website for such creators and consumers.  Recently one particular phenomenon has attracted my attention: heterosexual relationships wherein a character, depicted in her “home-text” as a strong, independent,…

  • The Pop Culture Lens on Avatar: The Last Airbender

    The Pop Culture Lens on Avatar: The Last Airbender

    In the twenty-sixth episode of The Pop Culture Lens podcast, Christopher Olson and I welcome friend of the podcast and return guest, Aaron Kashtan, to discuss the immensely popular hit from the early 21st century, Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005-2008). In this episode – which at times features poor audio due to issues with Skype,…

  • Pop Culture Lens on Akira

    Pop Culture Lens on Akira

    In the twenty-fifth episode of The Pop Culture Lens podcast, Christopher Olson and I welcome friend of the podcast, Charley Reed, to discuss one of the most influential anime feature films of all time, Akira (1988). Charley is a tremendous fan of the anime and manga, as is Chris, and we wanted to talk bout…

  • Convergent Wrestling: Call for Chapters

    Convergent Wrestling: Call for Chapters

    Official Call for Chapter Proposals Title: Colliding Inside the Squared Circle: The Convergent Nature of Professional Wrestling Editors: CarrieLynn D. Reinhard (Dominican University) & Christopher J. Olson (Dominican University) Purpose: The concept of convergence represents one of the most pervasive buzzwords in media studies, but with good reason. In essence, convergence concerns how the boundaries…

  • Pop Culture Lens: Dungeons and Dragons

    Pop Culture Lens: Dungeons and Dragons

    In the twenty-fourth episode of The Pop Culture Lens podcast, Christopher Olson (Seems Obvious to Me) and I welcome friend of the podcast, psychologist in training, and long-time gamer Steve Discont to discuss the classic table-top role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons. In this episode, we each recall our experiences with role-playing games, from Dungeons and…

  • Pop Culture Lens on They Live

    Pop Culture Lens on They Live

    In the twenty-third episode of The Pop Culture Lens podcast, Christopher and I welcome back friend of the podcast Joe Belfeuil to discuss John Carpenter’s 1988 cult classic They Live and how the film seems as relevant if not more now. The short story the film is based on can be found on this website.…