"Describe Yourself in Three Characters": Character Affiliation and Productive Consumption of Pop Culture

• In Event: We Are Constantly Building New Orders: Public Pedagogy and Its Challenges to the Given

Abstract

Drawing on qualitative data on adolescent girls’ engagements with pop culture, this paper will explore possible meanings and dimensions of character affiliation as experienced and expressed in a game that surged in popularity on Facebook under the hashtag #3CharacterDescription. Through this exploration, the author will seek to address what attracts young people to particular film and television characters and how the stories those characters enact—including their goals, desires, obstacles, and strategies; their ways of framing problems and solutions; and their personalities and worldviews—gain relevance in young people’s lives. The questions raised by the paper bring into view at least two issues: the forms of productive consumption made possible and/or encouraged in a popular culture shaped by social media and the relationship between productive consumption and the possibility of critique and resistance.

Author

• Mia Hood, Teachers College, Columbia University