My work examines how media entertainment and its audiences interact, and examines how and where value and meaning are created. More specifically, my research projects fall into one or more of the following areas: (1) textual theory, criticism, and analysis, (2) contemporary television studies, (3) new media extensions of and convergence with television and film, (4) satire, comedy, parody, and political entertainment, (5) international media consumption, and (6) qualitative audience studies, fandom, dislike, and anti-fandom.
My first book, "Watching with The Simpsons: Television, Parody, and Intertextuality," used The Simpsons to examine how audiences consume with a whole barrage of other images and structures learned from other items of media. This interest in how meaning and impact are constructed outside of the film or show itself extended to "Show Sold Separately: Promos, Spoilers, and Other Media Paratexts," about the vast universe of paratextual or “peripheral” items that surround all films and shows – such as trailers, bonus materials, licensed games, fan creations, reviews, and so forth. Having established how much audience reaction occurs outside and around an item of media itself, I then grew interested in a particular type of audience member – engaged dislikers – and in the legitimacy and frequent importance of their responses to media, even when they may have only consumed a little. While audience studies have told us much about fans, we still know comparatively little about annoyed, resentful, coerced, and belabored consumption, and my most recent (forthcoming) solo-authored book, "Dislike-Minded: Media, Audiences, and the Dynamics of Taste," draws from over 200 qualitative interviews to say more about what it means to really dislike something.