ABSTRACT After two years of #OscarsSoWhite—a critique of the lack of people of color in Oscars acting categories—the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 2016 proposed rule changes to speed up diversification of its voting membership. At the time, a subset of Academy members voiced their discontent at the prospect of losing their vote, and nowhere was their consternation more visible than in The Hollywood Reporter, which published a series of Oscar voter guest columns in response to both the critique of the nominations and the Academy’s diversification efforts. The guest columns along with the trade publication’s editorial practices emphasized more of the organizational conflict than the systemic bias in question. This article analyzes The Hollywood Reporter’s (THR) coverage of #OscarsSoWhite during the 2016 post-Oscar nominations period to demonstrate that (1) editorial framing by THR’s awards beat maintains the status-quo of the industry establishment by reporting on #OscarsSoWhite more as a procedural debate and membership quarrel over boycotts and the Academy’s rules than as a systemic phenomenon, and (2) the collective content of their Academy member guest columns uses discourses of strategic whiteness and color-blind racism to forward a narrative of meritocracy and white aggrievement.

ABSTRACT Through a survey of 2,627 media fans about generative AI, I find overwhelmingly negative sentiment despite nuanced distinctions across different AI applications and differences by demographic factors. Fans expressed substantial concern about social effects of generative AI like copyright infringement, environmental impact, corporate control, and threats to creator livelihoods. Qualitative analysis revealed that fans frame generative AI through moral discourse centered on labor, effort, and authenticity, frequently invoking concepts of “laziness” and “theft” while demanding clear disclosure through labeling. Respondents indicated willingness to enforce anti-AI norms through blocking, warning others, and, occasionally, public shaming, though many also asserted fandom values of community inclusivity and avoiding harassment. The findings demonstrate that fan communities are negotiating generative AI through frameworks of consent, credit, and creative labor that have long governed fan production, while grappling with tensions between individual autonomy and collective norm enforcement.

ABSTRACT This media analysis examines Survival of the Thickest, a Netflix comedy series created by Michelle Buteau, using hyper(in)visibility theory to explore how plus-size Black womanhood is represented in contemporary media. While nearly half of U.S. women identify as plus-size, their narratives are largely absent or stereotyped in mainstream television. Through a collaborative media analysis of Season 1, we advance three central claims: we demonstrate how the show exemplifies hyper(in)visibility, creates discourses of endearment, and reflects negative societal messaging toward plus-size individuals. Through scene-by-scene coding and repeated viewing, we identify examples of four forms of visibilityinvisibility, visibility, hypervisibility, and hyper(in)visibility—and document how the show challenges discursive, physical, political, economic, and legislative violence through humor, joy, and embodied resistance. Rather than reducing its main character to a trope, Survival of the Thickest centers a complex, stylish, and ambitious plus-size Black woman navigating love, friendship, and career. Our findings suggest the show models what affirming, intersectional fat representation can look like on screen. This representation matters. With the release of Season 2, this text continues to serve as a compelling site for further scholarly engagement on body politics and media power.

ABSTRACT Drawing on Stuart Hall’s work on popular culture and Mark McPhail’s concepts of complicity and negative difference, this article examines season one of Dance Moms as a case study in the racial politics of reality television. Situating the series within the political economy of unscripted programming, the analysis argues that the show produces Black femininity through constrained visibility, token inclusion, and narrative structures that privilege conflict and spectacle. Through a rhetorical cultural analysis of all 13 episodes of the first season, this study attends to dialogue, editing, costuming, and character positioning to demonstrate how Black girlhood is rendered hypervisible yet structurally marginalized. The Black mother–daughter duo’s resistance to racialized treatment is reframed as disruption, allowing hegemonic racial order to persist while appearing to engage difference. Ultimately, Dance Moms exemplifies how reality television naturalizes racial hierarchy and transforms inequality into consumable entertainment.

ABSTRACT Calls to decolonize media and communication scholarship have grown louder in recent years, yet little empirical work has examined the barriers African researchers face in contributing meaningfully to this agenda. This study explores the lived experiences of 32 African media and communication scholars across the continent, using semi-structured interviews. Our thematic analysis revealed systemic constraints, including epistemic discrimination in publishing, institutional neglect, digital exclusion, and skewed global collaborations that position African scholars as peripheral contributors. The findings expose how publishing is often driven more by promotion requirements than scholarly curiosity and how visa regimes and internal gatekeeping further limit global academic engagements. The study calls for strategic shifts in institutional policies and global publishing norms to support the resilience and visibility of African scholarship. It offers both scholarly insight and practical recommendations for fostering more inclusive and equitable knowledge production in media and communication research.