Fandom, Second Edition by Gray Jonathan; Sandvoss Cornel; Harrington C. Lee & Cornel Sandvoss & C. Lee Harrington

Author:Gray, Jonathan; Sandvoss, Cornel; Harrington, C. Lee & Cornel Sandvoss & C. Lee Harrington
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: SOC052000 Social Science / Media Studies
Publisher: New York University Press

13

“What Are You Collecting Now?”

Seth, Comics, and Meaning Management

Henry Jenkins

“What are you collecting now?” asks Chet (modeled after comic book artist Chester Brown), in a scene early in Seth’s 1996 graphic novel, It’s a Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken, while the fictionalized “Seth” starts pulling books off his shelf and replies, “I’ve got some GREAT stuff to show you!” (17).

Chet’s question conveys much. First, it indicates that the act of collecting (gathering, researching, appraising, showing “great stuff”) is a normative part of their lives together. But, second, the question implies that the objects of their collecting passions are variable, both within the individual (Seth makes new discoveries) and between them (Seth and Chet collect different stuff). What Seth ends up sharing with Chet—and with the readers of this graphic novel—is his discovery of Kalo, an obscure gag cartoonist who becomes the focus of Seth’s obsessive search for more—more work, more information.

It’s a Good Life, like Seth’s other works, is a collecting story—a story by, for, and about collectors. Seth’s characters are obsessed with “stuff,” “paper” collectibles (comics, books, posters, other printed ephemera) in particular: they devote their lives to acquiring, grooming, displaying, discussing, exchanging, and appraising stuff.

In Cult Collectors, Lincoln Geraghty (2014) protests the lack of critical attention directed toward collectors and their practices, as compared to other fan activities. This absence of studying collector culture perhaps reflects an ongoing discomfort among academics with forms of consumption that cannot easily be reread as forms of cultural production. Early fandom studies research (Jenkins 1992) sought to clear away negative stereotypes from popular media representations—including those that linked fandom to collecting—in order to prepare ground for an alternative and more empowering understanding. But graphic novels may be one place where collecting has been explored rather than dismissed. Understanding the kinds of stories comics tell about collecting may inspire new insights about the relationship between fandom, collecting, and consumer culture. With artists like Seth, it may be more productive to theorize with rather than against such representations; these artists are asking complex questions about how people construct their identities through consumption within works intended to be read by others who share their lifestyles and passions.

Seth himself never uses the word “fan,” consistently focusing on collectors. I respect that word choice throughout. Yet, what Seth’s characters consume (especially old comics, classic movies, and pulp magazines) and how (as part of their identities, in conversation with others, with passion and mastery) would make them fans by most definitions.

Like other fan practices, collecting is often understood through a Marxist lens as hyperconsumerism or through a Freudian lens as fetishism and narcissism. For the moment, I want to bracket both interpretations not as wrongheaded but as blinding us to other levels on which collecting operates. I want to tap cross-disciplinary research, especially in anthropology, on material culture, stuff, things, objects, junk, or ephemera. As Daniel Miller explains:

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