Obsessive Fandoms
Fandom is a subculture of fans who come together in solidarity to a common devotion and zeal for a franchise (Jenkins 2018). They know all the details there are to know about the franchise and they ardently follow the franchise, and some of them are even affected by it in ways of how they live their life and conduct themselves every day. The emergence of Fandoms has been rather profound in the 21st century. Fandoms can be identified based on gender, as Cheng and Yue found out that idolization of celebrities was more pronounced in women than in men (Cheng 2018). These phenomenon has been backed by several studies as Cheng indicates in their book Reviv et al. Female scored higher on indices of entertainment social subscale. Some of the reasons are because of some of the celebrities and what they represented related strongly to them and encompassed some aspects of their lives and what they go through daily. Cheng and Yue further expound the reason why women idolized celebrities with a study that indicated a high score for women on the CAS. Cheng and Yue distinguish the gender that has more inclination to the idolization of celebrities backed by research on the score of women on the CAS index, and gender can be used to identify obsessive Fandoms.
Jung and Hwang found out that culture also influenced the affinity of individuals to certain celebrities (Hwang 2017). Different countries have different cultures, and Jung found out that based on learning and the influence it had on the affiliation of people and celebrities, the participants in the study from the United States scored higher on culture affiliation than the rest of the participants from South Korea. There are different genres of music and movies, and they represent different cultures and advocate for various issues in society. The affinity of people to identify with multiple celebrities who represent different cultures is high because many countries were founded based on cultural affiliation. There are diverse cultures in each state, and there are different liking and prioritization of different things around the globe (Najam 2016). As Jung and Hwang further put it, culture affects people and based on Fandom it has an impact on the music industry because the more a person is an ardent fan of a celebrity the more they buy and associate with things tied to the personality in question. The culture bug is more pronounced in Indian compared to other countries as a study conducted by Jung and Hwang on borderline- pathological CW (Hwang 2016). The duo Jung and Hwang through a survey of marginal define culture as an identifier of obsessive fandoms in the society.
Age also correlates with the obsessive behavior of people with celebrities. Studies by Ashe and McCutcheon indicated a high obsessive behavior for personalities of people between the age of 10-11 and early adolescence (McCutcheon 2016). They further found out that the obsessive behavior reached its peak in the middle youth. Older people, however, showed a less obsessive pathological behavior and less endorsed the stalking or idolization of celebrities. As age catches up, the level of celebrity idolization reduces. The idols they used to subscribe or idolize when they were in their teenage years have also grown older, and as time goes on they grow out of it, and the upcoming artist at their age come up with different genres of music and movies that do not well identify with them. The study by Ashe also found out that women of advanced age from age 50 onwards showed a higher idolization of celebrities compared to their male counterparts of the same period (Groene 2016). As rightly observed, the level of celebrity endorsement reduces with age, and most populations who have passed adolescence minimizes the level of celebrity idolization, these cuts across in most of the countries as indicated by Ashe from the study of the obsessive pathological behavior of people who have passed the age of adolescence. Ashe identifies period as a factor that determines how people are obsessed with celebrities and identifies at what age the unhealthy behavior is pronounced and as a fandom identifying characteristic.
Social Media has been awash with many things with the advent of technology, and many people indulge in social media for a better part of their free time and sometimes even at work. Fandom behaviors can be identified through the formation of fan communities on social media where they share their views and opinions on the celebrities they follow (Price 2017). Menon indicates in her book that these online communities have specific codes of conduct under which they interact and identify. They agree upon a particular behavior for the members of the city. Menon says that many communities are now found online on social media platforms like facebook, twitter, and Instagram (Li 2016). These are where they organize a meeting which can be conducted online through video calls and initiation of new members into the group. Social Media Menon says it is crucial because there is no limitation of geographical distance given the flexibility of social media. Menon also means that fans are social, and many of them want to identify people who share the same interests with them, and social media is the best medium to meet new people who they relate.
Fan activity is also another behavior of fandoms n social media as pointed out by Moore that fans are defined as part with their everyday activities. Some fans might organize a get together in commemoration of their idolized celebrity or attend concerts held by the star in droves (Iwicka 2018). To participate in this activities, Moore says a fan must be obsessed with the artist in question. Most supporters in social media might initiate a campaign in online communities to support and advocate for the person they are affiliated to and actively defend them even if they are on the wrong. Fans Moore says they can open accounts in social media platforms to mimic what their favorite celebrities do and also follow their favorite stars and also like any picture or news about that celebrity. The many forms of activities that take place in social media such as fans being sponsors of their personalities give an understanding of the obsessive behavior of fandoms (Fuchs 2017). Fans can go out of their way to make sure that they meet their idolized celebrities such as sending the message request and stalking them on all social media platforms. Moore gives a clear picture on how fandoms behave on social media and giving the reasons for such behaviors as trying to show other people that they don’t merely identify with the celebrity but are ardent followers and fans of the given star.
Media has highly advanced fan activities. Some of the fans create imitations of the activities their favorite celebrities undertake. They might develop covers for music or video games based on the movies as Darren says these activities signify the passion that the fans have towards idolizing their favorite celebrities (Hayashi 2018). The assumption is that the actions will show other people their level of connection with the artist, and they stand for an excellent course. Darren says that the level with which fandom have dominated social media is only set to increase with new media being released mainly on social media platforms such as the launching of new movies and songs. He ardent followers of these celebrities are only set to increase, and the variation in behavior will reach its peak where the fandom fans do things to express their opinion on some issues about their idolized celebrities. Fandom in his article Darren says it varies from different age, class, and culture in any given country because there are some countries where people tend to worship the people they idolize and parade the deeds on social media for people to see for a chance to create a niche for themselves among the several fans of the celebrity (Tatum 2017). Music content has also changed to accommodate the needs and preferences of fans.
Griego indicates that social media has changed the narrative in celebrity endorsement were because of obsessive fandom (Ojha 2019). The more a celebrity has a huge following, the higher their ratings and most of them earn a lot of more because most brands want to be associated with artists who have a considerable following, especially in the music industry. It has changed the way music is made, and there has been diversification in the music industry with new genres being introduced or those that had been neglected, to gain more popularity due to obsessive fandoms. Griego goes further to say that the earning of musicians has majorly been determined by this obsessive fandom because of the introduction of music applications such as Spotify and iTunes where musicians upload their music and make money when the music is downloaded from these applications (Green 2017). It has also had an impact on what and how music is being produced.
Research method.
Obsessive fandom, as observed, is the display of affiliation towards a particular artist, and this is shown through their practices in everyday life. The research method to be used in the research of “obsessive “fandoms is qualitative analysis (Glaser 2017) based on the examples of music group such as Migos of the United States who have had so much success based on the level of fans they have been able to amass. They are riding high in the music industry, and the fan base keeps growing. Some fashion houses are even manufacturing shoes and cloths dubbed off white, which relates to the name of a member of the trio Migos (Mystic 2018). The qualitative analysis will be very instrumental in collecting data because it is through interviews and people giving their experiences and explaining the reasons why they use social media and the influence that the celebrities they follow, will there an identification of the extent to which the fandoms have impacted on music. It is in its way detailed more than the other research methods, and it will capture the necessary information and let the interviewees give their accounts on what they understand about the aspect of obsessive fandom. The qualitative research covers all areas of the study and is not limited to some regions (Flick 2018), but it cuts across the board and covers the elements of social media and their impacts on the music industry in conjunction with the activities of the fandoms.
Justification.
Many artists are dependent on the fan base to make it huge in the music industry (Gamble, 2017). The phenomenon has also been relatively unstudied and as in the case of Michael Jackson, where fans even fainted at the sight of seeing him and at one time was the bestselling artist after his demise. He was idolized by many of his followers, and some are mimicking his dance move moonwalk. These antics show the true extent of the obsessive fan base and the impact they have on the music industry from production to the careers and reception of the music produced by the various artists. The need to research this case is also seen in the case of artist group like the BTS boy band of Korea, who has risen to international fame despite being from Korea (Aisyah 2017). Although mostly singing in their native language they have bagged many awards courtesy of the massive following from their own country who shone a light and made them known worldwide. The necessity and justification for the research are also seen from artists like Justine Bieber who misbehaved by stomping an Argentine flag (Baker 2017) and later received a backlash from his fans and saw a decline in his record sales and concerts.
Citations
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