Call For Comments: Mythologizing the Founders

From Hannah: Last year for the fourth of July, VoxPopcast recorded a show based on Captain America’s mythos and how it ties in with patriotism and nationalism. This year, I thought that we might want to consider the way that we’ve mythologized the “founders” of America to the point of superhero status. (I mean, some…

Call for Comments: Transcosplaphobia?

From Mav: A funny “think” happened on my way to the Internet the other day… I was very much wanting to do SOMETHING having to do with Pride Month on our show and had been thinking of a couple of ideas. Well, if you’ve ever heard the show at all, it should be pretty clear…

e53. PCA/ACA 2019 Preview: Comic Studies

On last week’s episode, Katya and Hannah shared the topics of their papers for this year’s upcoming PCA/ACA. Now it’s Wayne and Mav’s turn to do the same. As we prepare to head off to the conference this week, Wayne shares the basics of his topic, a Jungian psychological evaluation of the Kevin Matchstick, the…

e52. PCA/ACA 2019 Preview: Game Studies

If you’ve been listening to the show for a while, then you’ve no doubt heard us mention the PCA/ACA conference that all four of us are attending in a few weeks. It’s a place where academics get together and share their work on popular culture. In fact, it’s a while lot like this show and…

e51. So What Is Subculture Anyway?

We’ve been talking a lot about subcultures on our last couple of episodes. And the terms comes up a lot on the internet — usually negatively — to refer to everything from hipsters and punks and goths and geeks to Republicans and Democrats to Christians and Muslims to … uh… MAGA hat wearers. Often if…

Call For Comments: The PCA/ACA Preview Special

From Mav: We’re doing something a little different on the next show. One of the reasons we started VoxPop was because as academics we end up doing a lot of academic conferences… and we had the idea that the kinds of discussion we have at them would make for an interesting show, especially since my…

e50. Are You What You Wear?

Somewhere along the line, when they were making the show The Big Bang Theory, someone said “hey, this guy is a geek. Put him in comic book T-shirts, and everyone will know.” And then wardrobe was done with Sheldon. Next they decided to dress Penny and they said “Umm, she’s a hot actress. Make sure…

Call For Comments: Hipsters and Bikers and Goths, Oh My!

From Mav: A couple weeks, I saw a fun article floating around social media about a man who complained when he saw his own photo being used for an article about an MIT study that about why “all hipsters look alike” because of how insulting it was to say that… only to later find out…

e47. Milkshake Ducks & Problematic Artists

It seems like it happens every day lately. Your favorite writer, comedian, singer, actor, sports star, politician or whatever suddenly hits the news because it turns out he’s a racist, rapist, sexist, homophobe, murderer or otherwise deplorable person. Particularly in the #MeToo era, we’re seeing this more and more with the likes of Bill Cosby,…

e46. Black Superheroes and Representation

(Note: This episode initially contained a corrupted audio file. It has been cleaned up and reuploaded. The current uploaded version should have better sound. Sorry for the inconvenience) As we close out February and Black History month, we thought that it would be a fun idea to talk about the importance of representation, diversity and…