Mashing up, remixing, and contesting the popular memory of Hillary Clinton

Abstract

This essay looks at the viral video "Rebel Girl," released in 2015, which was produced by fans of Hillary Clinton. Following the trajectory of the video, one can see the potential for fan mashups to make arguments that subvert dominant narratives of public memory and, conversely, the way the way mainstream media moves to subsume outsider voices.

Daenerys Targaryen Will Save Spain: Game of Thrones, Politics, and the Public Sphere

“…Social media affordances change both the individual and collective aspects of “mobilization processes by introducing new types of communication structure and by allowing for new communication forms” (Enjolras et al 2013, 891). This ability to not only consume and distribute but also produce artifacts makes fans key players within the political sphere (Davisson 2016).…”

“…Given the growing role of television fiction within the contemporary cultural sphere, it seems not only pertinent but also necessary for political parties, associations, and institutions to use it as a tool of communication to followers and potential voters. What is more, “participatory culture has prepared fans to see places where they can intervene and reshape political conversation” (Davisson 2016) using their own capacities to produce, alter, and recontextualize media artifacts. This is not a process without dangers.…”

‘Every adventure begins with a cup of coffee’: Black rifle coffee company, reactionary fandom, and the tactical body

“…Fan scholars have explored how fan communities engage in ‘fan activism’ or ‘fan-based citizenship’ to motivate others to engage in the public sphere (Hinck, 2019; Jenkins and Shresthova, 2012). Conversely, fan scholarship has also explored how affective attachment drives individuals and communities to spread political messaging and deploy fannish tactics (Davisson, 2016; De Kosnik, 2008; Erikson, 2008; Miller, 2020). Politicized fandom may now be an established feature of contemporary politics, significantly shaping citizen participation in political debate and the democratic process (Dean, 2017).…”

Remix videos and the mnemonic imagination: Emotional memories of late Soviet childhood

“…The purpose of remix videos such as these is to generate new meaning through the montage of separate images; they may therefore be called a digital argument, drawing on visual, aural and textual vocabularies to alter established memory discourses (Davisson, 2016). Replete with the suggestion that the moral and social underpinnings of life in the past were vastly superior to that of the present, the videos foreground the perceived essence of late Soviet childhood in post-Soviet mnemonic imagination.…”