Viral Video as Genre: Approaching Genre Theory for Networked Digital Media

• In Event: Scholar to Scholar I

Abstract

Looking to the construction of genre theories for other popular culture texts as guidance, this paper begins the work of outlining how a genre analysis of viral video might most fruitfully be approached. The result is a call to map the operation of genre not just at the levels of textual form and aesthetics, but in a manner that is also mindful of changing medium specificities and culture industry dynamics.

Author

• David Gurney, Northwestern University