From Mav (with Matt Linton): We've talked a lot on our show about Laura Mulvey's theory of the "the male gaze". In short, the male gaze describes the tendency of narratives to position female characters primarily as objects of desire to be consumed by male protagonists and readers. It argues that regardless of the reader's personal sexual identity, the narrative often positions the reader to interact with the story as a straight male. Most importantly, it surmises a female character whose job is "to be looked at". Being attractive to the audience is her main role before anything else. We've talked about how people tend to misuse the term and the theory and we've talked about how the theory has been extended to other "gazes" in the decades since Mulvey...
Read More
Call for Comments: The Male Gaze and its Discontents
From Katya: This week we’re revisiting the Male Gaze. I know we’ve been here before but we have a string of guests coming up offering their own spin on various…
e165. PCA-2021 Recap
It’s the PCA-2021 recap show! In many ways, Popular Culture Association(PCA) national conference is responsible for this show. One of the things we’ve always strived for is to have the…
e164. Why Do We Love Plot Twists?
On today’s episode we reveal that secretly this geeky little pop culture show was always actually about education and academic all along. Did you pick up on the clues we’ve…
Call For Comments: Why Are Plot Twists?
From Mav: It’s the episode you’ve been waiting for. After Katya’s sudden and surprising death via plot device, on next week’s show we’re going to explain which of Hannah, Wayne…
Call for Comments: American Girl
From Hannah: As a kid growing up in the nineties, I loved American Girl, especially its historical characters and books. I still remember excitedly reading the adventures of Kit Kittredge and Kirsten…
e162. Multimedia & Literary Crossovers
We live in a geeky world. There are roughly 800 bajillion superhero tv shows and movies released every year. Even once we get away from superhero content, we quickly move…
e161. Describing 20 Games We Haven’t Played
Do you like to play games? We do. And Hannah really likes to play games. In fact, she’s addicted. So much so that she made a game about games… and…
Call for Comments: Why Do People Like Crossovers?
From Mav: Recently, on my other show, GoshGollyWow, we had a brief conversation about crossovers. Well, it was recently for me, anyway… It will be in the future for listeners…
Call for Comments: She’s Not Like Other Girls! Introducing the Fanboy Gaze
June 11, 2021
From Mav (with Matt Linton): We’ve talked a lot on our show about Laura Mulvey’s theory of the “the male gaze”. In short, the male gaze describes the tendency of…