We Heart Japan: Fan Citizenship and the Role of Institutions in the Response to Japanese Earthquakes

Abstract

The 2011 Great East Japan earthquake and resulting tsunami that devastated the nation created a situation that, through the global flows of media content, necessitated a response from the international anime fan community. This response was shaped by the ethical framework of caring for the community. Performances of fan citizenship reflected this existing community value and the community’s identification with other fans and the people of Japan. Reflecting these identifications, fans took civic action in the form of the ethical modalities of donating money to relief efforts and critiquing community discourse that diverted attention from the disaster. Institutions, like the streaming service Crunchyroll, served to rhetorically define the ethical modalities at play in this context through their institutional role of amplifying performances of fan citizenship.

Civic culture in the Supernatural fandom: Misha Collins, Destiel, and the 2020 US presidential election

“…Research on fandom and politics indicates that the cultures, practices, and identities of fandom and politics are increasingly overlapping in complex ways. Fans engage in grassroots fan activism and other civic engagement, raising money for charity and launching voter registration efforts (Cochran, 2012;Jones, 2012;Jenkins, 2016;Hinck, 2019;Miller, 2020aMiller, , 2020aMiller, , 2020a. Celebrities, like Donald Trump, turn into politicians (Street, 2004).…”