Lately, my greatest delight is coming across unpopped bubble wrap and just sitting and popping it, bubble by bubble. Sums up my state of mind pretty well, tbh.

I want trans kids. I want to live in a world absolutely brimming with happy, thriving, safe trans kids. I will fight for that world with everything I have. And I hope that I am helping to build it, playing some small role in manifesting the world where no one else has to live with this kind of fear.

The application deadline for the 2026 Japan-America Student Conference is in 10 days. (I guess that means it will soon be 25 years since I attended the conference.) I encourage anyone at a US college or university to check it out. iscdc.org/jasc

アメリカ歴史学会の年次総会に参加される方は、JPPのオペレーション・リーダー、ポーラ・R・カーティスとの面談をぜひご検討ください。🗓️ 期限まで残り三週間となりましたので、面談を希望される方は、2026年1月5日までにご連絡ください！

Ack, I should have spelled it out. Let's try this again... The latest issue (52) of the Japanese Journal of Religious Studies @jjrs-nirc.bsky.social has been published! 🥳 nirc.nanzan-u.ac.jp/journal/6/is... Read more about the individual articles below 👇

Introduce yourself with five concerts you've seen. Billy Joel (1987) Leslie Cheung (1997) Hotei Tomoyasu (2003) (literally that's it)(ironically, all in Japan)

And of course when they are finally given the scriptures, they've been redacted.

My forthcoming book on K-pop fandom looks at how parasocial relationships in K-pop today can be viewed as asymmetrical relationships -- never entirely one-way, but in many cases, two-way, asymmetric-yet-mutual attachments 💞

Slight tangent, but Godzilla’s roots connect to Ainu culture alongside Japan's nuclear history - something rarely mentioned. Composer Akira Ifukube, from Kushiro, spent lots of time around Ainu. Learned this when visiting Akan Ainu woodcarver Ushijima Takahiro who showed me a wood Godzilla he made.

This is such a great article by Eva Cheuk-Yin Li & Ka-Wei Pang about a specific incident in fandom in which discourse around AI deepfakes was weaponised by fans. Beyond the incident itself, it offers a thoughtful example of how to engage with fandom incidents with care and respect.

Aca-Alien-Colleagues I’m putting together a Companion on the Alien Franchise and have some gaps on abstracts about Alien Earth (all angles welcome), Romulus, and the crossover/influence with the Predator franchise. If of interest contact me at: [email protected]

I feel like it's time to grow a backbone and have a little faith in myself. I'm really tired of debilitating self-doubt, especially when there's no reason for it.

Lost my research mojo during the height of COVID, and I'm still trying to get it back ... resulting in a kind of personally profound loss of my sense of self.

New book ⬇️⬇️⬇️ The Routledge Handbook of Fan Video and Digital Authorship Edited By Louisa Ellen Stein, Samantha Close #FanStudies www.routledge.com/The-Routledg...

Please join us this Friday at 10am ET for a conversation between Rebecca Wanzo and @alfredmartin.bsky.social on his groundbreaking new book, Fandom For Us, By Us. Follow the link below to register!

My book Manga's First Century: How Creators and Fans Made Japanese Comics, 1905-1989, comes out in October! And it's eligible for a 25% discount in Barnes & Noble's preorder sale. The first printing paperback includes 12 pages of full color images! www.barnesandnoble.com/w/mangas-fir...

I'm really excited that a collection of fascinating work on fandom, fans and AI that @suzannerblack.bsky.social and I co-edited is out today in the new volume of @journal.transformativeworks.org - and as the journal's first 'New Currents' section! Read our editorial here doi.org/10.3983/twc....

Former SIG co-chair Rebecca Williams is quoted in a recent article in the Atlantic about Netflix, along with SIG member Abigail DeKosnik. We love when the pop press interviews scholars!

behold the bold and brave washington post opinion section (under new management), lol

Hey a thing I really don’t want to get lost here is that while Tylenol doesn’t cause autism, IT’S FINE TO BE AUTISTIC. Let’s not grant them the premise that autism should be eradicated in our way to correct the science, okay? Okay.

A while ago, Lincoln Geraghty, @acafanmom.bsky.social, @memorieschild.bsky.social & myself did a special issue on “The Past, Present & Future of Fan Fiction”. This is now being reprinted in book format, & available for download for free #FanStudies www.mdpi.com/books/reprin...

There's a reason why films like K-Pop Demon Hunters is now the most-watched film on the Netflix (hint: it's not about K-pop). It's about what resonates with audiences (and fans!) in the end. www.theguardian.com/media/2025/a...

Another great and mostly unknown source of pure pleasure: SAKKA share.google/0zu6eU3Xqqye...

Japan makes so many good films, and sadly most of the live action ones are completely non-viable in the English market. Which means that this platform is absolutely priceless.

Column: The Corporation for Public Broadcast is ‘winding down.’ What does that mean for public radio and TV? I talk with media studies professor and public media expert Josh Shepperd for an explainer. In short, it's dire Gift 🔗

I did a parasocial episode! We talk about creepy fans, why this term blew up over the last decade, and if anyone *really* thinks they're friends with celebrities.

Abstracts and info are up online for The Magical Kingdom: Exploring Disney’s Impact on Popular Culture virtual conference on July 24 & 25 www.popcrn.org

Not being glib here but I do think over saturation of super hero movies has contributed to this. Just sit back and wait for a Hero to take down the Bad Guy. Only the Hero can save us.

“The Risk of Serialized Reality: On ‘Big Fiction’ and ‘The New Seriality'” — Mesha Maren in The Metropolitan Review In a recent article for The Metropolitan Review, novelist Mesha Maren reads Dan Sinykin's Big Fiction: How Conglomeration Changed the Publishing Industry and American Literature…

Gift link: www.theatlantic.com/internationa...

That one person can drag us into a war without consulting or even notifying Congress, or our allies, or fully explaining to the American people why this is necessary, is absolutely bonkers. Reminder that Congress has the power to stop all of this. Where the hell are they? Hello?

Expected to f*** up the airports, too. We should at least get our own version of Ri Chun-hee for the broadcast.

Our first piece of the year is live—and it's a big one! With the recent release of the classic BBC sci-fi show Blake's 7 on Blu-ray, @scenicrailway.bsky.social looks back at the infamous 1980s clash between fans and creators that became known as the Slash Wars. 🚀 Read or listen to an audio version:

Stop Forcing A.I. Into Every Fucking Thing!

Trump plans an expensive grand military parade on June 14 for his 79th b-day amid growing recession warnings. According to the AP, the Army plans call for more than 6.6k soldiers, at least 150 vehicles, 50 helicopters, seven bands & possibly a couple thousand civilians. apnews.com/article/army...

NEW CFP ALERT! 📣 Check out the details of our upcoming special issue on Latin American Fandoms guest edited by Yazmín Carrizales and Libertad Garzón at the following link: buff.ly/2Ow8Jon...! Deadline is 1/1/2026!

Great piece by @joshshepperd.bsky.social in @us.theconversation.com about origins of U.S. public broadcasting. U.S. Public Broadcasting began in 1920s, as a public service ideal, with professors constructing radio stations, often in rural areas to serve citizens. theconversation.com/trump-and-ma...

For the wonderful folks at @ellipsus.com, I wrote a guest post about fic and generative AI! As people yank archives for LLMs or "finish" others' work with these tools, we're increasingly seeing AI used to create fic, too. But if you outsource the act of being a fan to AI, what does that leave you?

Its the ease with which universities have suddenly the money to pay for AI subscriptions, AI professorships, AI workshops, AI everything while they reassure us that "there is no money" to pay grad students and precarious faculty living wages.

going through and saving all of my polygon pieces. can't believe this is the first thing i wrote for them. really came out swinging. and it was thanks to patches shooting me an email bc of a twitter thread i had made. www.polygon.com/2020/7/23/21...

The tagline of this otaku dictionary is maybe perfect? 知っているだけで恥ずかしいーYou'll be embarrassed just to know these words. So nerdy, the words themselves bring shame, proof that it is *the* geek dictionary of choice.

The distance from "federal workers can" to "federal workers must" is short and well traveled www.businessinsider.com/maga-hats-fe...

something I really appreciate about Pascal is that he's using his position - which is very secure, he's hugely successful and they're not going to throw away a bunch of money firing him - to be this outspoken it's important that everyone speak out on trans rights but especially big names

Not to put too fine a point on it, but fascist anti-intellectualism is incoherent (i.e. ban "diversity" but do censorship in the name of intellectual "diversity") because it's anti-intellectual. They don't believe in things, they cling to power. www.wfyi.org/news/article...

Men in plainclothes, one in a balaclava, raided the Charlottesville courthouse today. They abducted a local painter whose case (allegedly fighting with his roommate) was being dismissed, and another who was there paying fines. They took them away in unmarked vans. dailyprogress.com/news/local/c...

Such a great way of articulating this issue. I'll also add that they don't just lie: they invert. So "protecting democracy" = "fascism" "Fighting antisemitism" = Enforcing bigotry "Protecting children" = trans hate/targeting trans children Fighting "oppressive" DEI = Anti-Black policies

The Trump regime is now using US Attorneys to intimidate academic journals by sending them letters demanding they explain how they ensure ‘viewpoint diversity.’ Journal editors should be public about this and coordinate to refuse to comply with these fascist tactics.

“Many academics tell us they’re avoiding US travel entirely due to genuine fears about border detention and visa issues” www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Looks like TBN in the oval office (for my atheist and agnostic friends, that's Trinity Broadcasting network, Televangelist hell)