American Popular Culture Commons^™

Humanity, Ai, And The Pedagogy Of Vince Gilligan’S Pluribus, J. Scarlett Kingsley

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This review discusses the tv show Pluribus as a contemporary television narrative that functions as an allegory for artificial intelligence and its implications for human meaning-making. Centering on Carol Sturka, one of thirteen individuals immune to a alien global virus that merges humanity into a cooperative “Hive Mind”, the series explores tensions between autonomy and collective well-being in a “peaceful apocalypse.” The analysis argues that the Hive Mind reflects key concerns surrounding AI, including the production of knowledge without understanding, personalization without discernment, and efficiency that bypasses the struggle through which meaning is formed. Drawing on John Searle’s distinction between …

Book Review: The History And Politics Of Star Wars: Death Stars And Democracy, Petra Hendrickson

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

Book Review: The History and Politics of Star Wars: Death Stars and Democracy

How Philip K. Dick Used The Unreliable Narrator To Transport Unwitting Acolytes, Michael Barros, Jordi Smith

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This essay examines the use of the unreliable narrator to transport the reader into narrative worlds, specifically in Philip K. Dick's fiction. By exploring the phenomenon of narrative transportation and the role of emotions in engagement with fiction, we argue that Dick's use of the unreliable narrator significantly engages and transports readers into his narrative worlds. Subsequently, we contend that his belief in the fundamental reality of those worlds is effectively positioning himself as a gatekeeper and mediator between the narrative world and the real world, which sets him, in his mind, as a prophet, using fiction as a tool …

Review Of Supernatural: A History Of Television’S Unearthly Road Trip By Erin Giannini, Duane Ebesu

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

No abstract (book review)

The Pope, American Politics, And The Battle For Tolkien’S Soul In The Twenty-First Century, Kelsey A. Fuller-Shafer

Journal of Tolkien Research

This essay considers the contemporary ramifications of the use of Tolkien’s works and personhood in the political and cultural dialogues of the United States. Tolkien’s fiction was recently cited by Pope Leo XIV, the first pope from the United States, in his encyclical letter in May of 2026 reacting to artificial intelligence, in the same era that tech billionaires are selecting names for their AI companies from Tolkien’s legendarium. These actors find themselves not just in a dispute about ethical usage of AI, but also as commentators on and subjects to the growing political divide in the United States, and …

Entering The Villa: Love Island Usa Season 7 As A Site For Neoliberal Prosumption, Laura Cunningham

CLAMANTIS: The MALS Journal

No abstract provided.

Performance Of Illustrations And Images As Language In Sarnath Banerjee’S All Quiet In Vikaspuri, Akanksha Barthwal Ms

SANE journal: Sequential Art Narrative in Education

Sarnath Banerjee’s All Quiet in Vikaspuri, fictionalizes but at the same time addresses water wars and political ideologies in the city of Delhi. By the means of eco-critical approach in the name of Vi-kas (development) Banerjee discuss the acts of slow violence subverted on nature in the name of progress (vikas). Through text/ images the author depicts chaos and challenges for the readers in more direct and obscene ways. The current paper attempts to look at Banerjee’s illustrations and images as new form of language emerged in modern Indian literature with the possibly that illustrations have more effect on …

From Chennai To Texas: Major League Cricket, Glocalization, And The Uber-Sport Assemblage, Glenn Houlihan

Journal of Global South Sport Studies

This article examines Major League Cricket (MLC), an American professional Twenty20 (T20) cricket franchise league which began in July 2023 with a sold-out match at Grand Prairie Stadium in Grand Prairie, Texas. The fans in attendance were predominantly immigrants from South Asia, a region where cricket is the dominant sport. MLC’s connection to South Asia, however, extends beyond domestic U.S. fandom, as four of the league’s six franchises are operated by Indian Premier League (IPL) teams. Here, the IPL is expanding operations into the U.S. market, leveraging the recognizable branding of the league’s teams to offer the nascent MLC a …

Hope, Incorporated: Welborn Hope As B.A. Botkin's "Promising" Oklahoma Poet, Cullen Whisenhunt

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

In 1927, a letter by then-professor at the University of Oklahoma, Roy Temple House, was published in the Ada Evening News complimenting Ada, OK, poet Welborn Hope and suggesting Hope get in touch with folklorist and literary scholar BA Botkin, also an OU faculty member. That same year, Botkin published “Oklahoma Poets, Inc.,” in which he detailed what he believed to be the three stages of a state’s literary development: the pioneer stage, the popular rhymesters stage, and finally, the union of art and life (30-31). In 1935, Botkin presented a lecture in Tulsa in which he cited Hope among …

The Monster On The Hill: "Anti-Hero" And Its Connection To Frankenstein, Alexa B. Rogers

The Manuscript: Journal of Taylor Swift Studies

Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero” is known as the leading single from her deeply personal album, Midnights. It is the third track on the album, known for typically being a pop hit yet unexpectedly devastating as it captures her anxieties and sheds light on her relationship with femininity in a way that many women throughout history can relate to and have been expressing in their writing. In exploring these anxieties, Swift sings about feeling like a monster. She is hardly the first woman to compare her femininity to a monster. These lyrics immediately spring Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, since some of …

Beyond Green: Re-Reading "Wicked" As Anthropological Text, Tan Gia Bao Huynh

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This paper examines "Wicked" through the lens of cultural borderlands, revealing how the musical dramatizes the creation and navigation of social boundaries. By analyzing Elphaba's journey, the research demonstrates how her green skin serves as a powerful metaphor for cultural otherness, while her experiences at Shiz University and beyond illustrate strategies of resistance, accommodation, and identity formation familiar to those navigating between dominant and marginalized spaces. Particularly significant is the paper's examination of Oz's propaganda system, which demonstrates how cultures manufacture monsters and heroes through selective storytelling and public ritual. This analysis offers fresh insights into "Wicked's" enduring appeal, suggesting …

Southern By The Grace Of God: Religion, Race, And Civil Rights In Hollywood’S American South, Paul Harvey

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Megan Hunt, Southern by the Grace of God: Religion, Race, and Civil Rights in Hollywood’s American South (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2024).

Super Soapbox

Emerging Writers

American superhero comics have always had some sort of political/socio-political spin to them. During the Golden Age of the 1930's to 50's, characters such as Superman and Captain America appeared in World War II propaganda fighting the Axis Powers. The following Silver Age from the 50's to 70's became infamous for its self-censorship under The Comics Code Authority, which in practice banned LGBTQ+ representation. However, the gradual retirement of the CCA's regulations allowed titles such as Uncanny X-Men and The Dark Knight Returns to cover heavier topics such as racism and political corruption during the Bronze Age of the 70's …

“No Ifs, Ands, Or Butts”: Analyzing Race And Gender In Sex And The City Through Black Feminist Theory, Daniella Orias

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This article analyzes Season 3, Episode 5 of Sex and the City, “No Ifs, Ands, or Butts,” through the lens of Black feminist theory. It investigates how race and gender are constructed, stereotyped, and selectively represented within the episode’s narrative. The analysis focuses on two Black characters who were featured only in one episode of the series, Adeena and Chivon, and examines how the show portrays harmful stereotypes such as the angry Black woman (Adeena) and sexualized Black male (Chivon) in the episode. These limited and harmful representations are further scrutinized by the fact that the show is often …

Brute Force Branding: Variations & Repetitions Of The Almighty Dollar Banknote, Rui-Long Monico

Artl@s Bulletin

Abstract: This paper examines the U.S. dollar as a global brand and mythic icon, revealing how its stable aesthetic asserts dominance and infiltrates daily life. Through visual analysis and global comparison, it shows how banknotes are battlegrounds where art, identity, and geopolitics collide—currency as a weapon of soft power and cultural hegemony. The dollar’s visual inertia—ritualized, repeated, reappropriated—cements its supremacy as a symbolic force, where repetition enforces authority and variation sparks both resistance and conformity. Banknotes emerge as tools of statecraft and vessels of collective memory, as reflected in the author’s bespoke creation accompanying this study.

Résumé: Cet article analyse …

Into Me See: Visibility, Recognition, And The Need To Be Seen In Kazuo Ishiguro’S Never Let Me Go, Vicki L. Wine Carney

Anthós

While critical scholarship on Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go often emphasizes bioethics, transhumanism, and the commodification of life, this lens overlooks the novel’s profound engagement with the psychological necessity of visibility. This paper argues that the tragedy of the clones is fundamentally a crisis of recognition, where invisibility is not incidental but structurally produced to facilitate exploitation. Drawing on Caroline Levine’s concept of the "Form of Utility" and Axel Honneth’s Theory of Recognition, this study examines how systemic indoctrination and objectification deny the clones their innate humanity to soothe the conscience of the "normals." Furthermore, it analyzes the characters’ …

Guidos And Grenades: Shaming Discourses In Mtv’S Jersey Shore, Mackenzie K. Mickavicz Ms., Aubree A. Herman

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

MTV’s Jersey Shore, launched in 2009, reached nearly 9 million viewers at the peak of its popularity. Inspired by the language used by the show’s male cast members to criticize a woman’s weight and appearance, such as “grenade” and “atomic bomb,” this study applies social congitive theory and reality television framework to analyze instances of shaming on Jersey Shore. Through a mixed-methods analysis, this study identifies the various forms of shaming depicted and explores how gender dynamics and character relationships affect these interactions. Findings reveal the most frequent forms of shaming, shame targets, and shame initiators as well as …

From Prometheus To Pygmalion To Pandora: Teaching Greek Mythology With Frankenstein’S “Dark Brides”, Kyle William Bishop

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

As Mary Shelley unambiguously informs readers on the title page of her 1818 novel Frankenstein, her tale of Victor’s discovery of the secret of non-biological reproduction represents the Promethean myth, a morality tale warning against the usurpation of divine authority. In Shelley’s novel, Victor ultimately recognizes the dangerous path he has discovered, and he refuses to create a female companion for his hideous progeny, risking his own life to protect the world from a potential race of monsters. In the cinematic tradition, however, this unrealized “bride” often has been created, and these fantastic narratives realize the Pygmalion myth, that …

Star Wars: Andor – An Abolitionist Study Guide, Marcelo Garzo Montalvo, Isaac Ginsberg Miller

Feminist Pedagogy

This study guide provides a set of activities for teaching abolition through Season 1 of the speculative fiction TV series Star Wars: Andor (2022). Through the practice of critical literacy (viewing, reading, and analysis), we offer various ideas on how to engage Andor as a relevant pedagogical tool for studying and teaching abolitionist movement histories and methodologies. By guiding students through a critical analysis of this widely-circulated, mainstream cultural text, we seek to activate an abolitionist pedagogical lens that can be applied across various genres and media – making tangible connections between popular culture and political struggles writ large. These …

El Corazón Del Movimiento Continúa: Chicana/O Prison Art, Artivism, And A Call To Creation, Trisha Martinez, Gerald Lovato, Eric Christo Martinez

Regeneración: A Xicanacimiento Studies Journal

El Corazón del Movimiento Continúa: Chicana/o Prison Art, Artivism, and a Call to Creation by Trisha Martinez, Gerald Lovato, and Eric Christo Martinez.

Book Review Of: Univision, Telemundo, And The Rise Of Spanish-Language Television In The United States, Elizabeth Sotelo

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

Craig Allen’s Univision, Telemundo, and the Rise of Spanish-Language Television in the United States (2020) meticulously encapsulates the business challenges and subsequent success of Spanish-language television networks in the United States. Grounded in hard data, archival research, reporting, and interviews, the author expands the study beyond the U.S. to trace the initiatives’ roots to Mexico. The book’s nine chapters weave a chronological narrative that covers the period from 1961 to 2012. Throughout the book, Allen explores the beginning of Univision in San Antonio in 1961, the birth of Telemundo in 1986, the pioneers and the investments involved, and the creation …

Fraggin’ The Superhero Genre: Parody And Carnival In Dc’S Lobo, Ryan L. Johnson

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This essay examines the DC anti-hero Lobo as an ideal example of the constructive, creative power of parody and Bakhtinian carnival. Unlike Bakhtin’s assertion that carnival since the Renaissance has lost its spirit of play and become purely destructive, Lobo uses grotesque violence to create just as much as he destroys social norms. Ultimately, the mini-series under consideration provide a valuable tool for students to understand carnival, parody, and its power as criticism.

Witnessing Healing Through Fantasy: Trauma, Community, And Art In A Court Of Thorns And Roses, Alexandria A. Remm

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

Drawing on theorists such as Bruno Bettelheim, Lucy Bonds, Stef Craps, Dominick LaCapra, and Laura Loumeau-May, this paper explores the role of trauma and healing in Sarah J. Maas’ A Court of Thorns and Roses (ACOTAR) series by examining protagonist Feyre Archeron’s journey. Specifically, Feyre’s journey with trauma and how she heals throughout the series. The analysis highlights how Feyre’s recovery is deeply tied to empathy, her acts of artistic creation, and her evolving relationships with others, especially with those who have also endured their own trauma. In addition to textual analysis, the paper incorporates reader and fan responses—particularly fanart …

The Big Bang Theory’S Blurred (Tele)Vision Of Scientific Ethics: Some Thoughts For Educators Who Want To Change The Channel, Lee-Anne Broadhead, Sean J. Howard

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This article investigates the way the popular American television program The Big Bang Theory represents the pursuit of scientific knowledge and reflects on the cultural and educational implications of the show’s contradictory problematization and valorization of the reductionist method at the core of modern Eurocentric science. Drawing on story-lines relating to military research, animal experimentation, and pharmaceutical drug trials, we consider the show’s precarious balance of implicit critique (the consistent exposé of systematically violent, often unethical research) and overt celebration (the presentation of science as “cool,” and its practitioners as flawed but endearing). This tension, we argue, enhances the show’s …

Billiken As Transcultural Object From American Mascot To Japanese Pop Deity, M.W. Shores

Asia Pacific Perspectives

This article examines Billiken’s transcultural journey from American novelty mascot (1908) to cultural icon, illuminating early twentieth-century Pacific exchange networks and patterns of cultural adaptation. Drawing on American and Japanese archives, it demonstrates how this commercial figure, born from Progressive Era optimism and incorporating Japanese (and Orientalist) design elements, was transformed within Japanese religious and cultural frameworks. The study analyzes Billiken’s metamorphosis from “good luck” commodity to quasi-religious icon, particularly in Osaka’s Shinsekai district, where strategic marketing drove his its late twentieth-century revival after decades of obscurity. While largely forgotten in America and elsewhere, Billiken’s endurance in Osaka challenges narratives …

Book Review: Starry Field: A Memoir Of Lost History By Margaret Juhae Lee, Brook Mcclurg

Asian American Literature: Discourses & Pedagogies

No abstract provided.

Without Them, There Is No You: The Role Of Personal Choice And History In Resisting Political Control, Heidi Turner

Asian American Literature: Discourses & Pedagogies

In 2011, Korean-American journalist Suki Kim went undercover as an English teacher at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, working to teach her students while simultaneously recording everything she could about the workings of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). In 2014, her book Without You, There is No Us was published as a memoir, in part due to the inclusion of personal details considered less relevant to the story, thereby undercutting her journalistic credentials.

Here, using C. S. Lewis’s The Abolition of Man as a theoretical framework for understanding oppressive regimes and the ways that they control …

Full Circle, Full Century: An Interview With Mitsuye Yamada, Noelle Brada-Williams, Elizabeth J. Asborno

Asian American Literature: Discourses & Pedagogies

No abstract provided.

Introduction To Volume Thirteen: Teaching In Dangerous Times, Noelle Brada-Williams

Asian American Literature: Discourses & Pedagogies

No abstract provided.

Aaldp Cover Volume 13, Derick Truong

Asian American Literature: Discourses & Pedagogies

No abstract provided.