Eating Fandom

This book considers the practices and techniques fans utilize to interact with different aspects and elements of food cultures. With attention to food cultures across nations, societies, cultures, and historical periods, the collected essays consider the rituals and values of fan communities as reflections of their food culture, whether in relation to particular foods or types of food, those who produce them, or representations of them. Presenting various theoretical and methodological approaches, the anthology brings together a series of empirical studies to examine the intersection of two fields of cultural practice and will appeal to sociologists, geographers and scholars of cultural studies with interests in fan studies and food cultures.

CarrieLynn D. Reinhard is associate professor in the Department of Communication Arts and Sciences at Dominican University, USA. Her research focuses on innovating methodological approaches in audience, reception, and fan studies. She is the author of Fractured Fandoms: Contentious Communication in Fan Communities, the coauthor of Possessed Women, Haunted States: Cultural Tensions in Exorcism Cinema and the coeditor of Making Sense of Cinema: Empirical studies into Film Spectators and Spectatorship; Heroes, Heroines, and Everything in Between: Challenging Gender and Sexuality Stereotypes in Children's Entertainment Media; and Convergent Wrestling: Participatory Culture, Transmedia Storytelling, and Intertextuality in the Squared Circle. Julia E. Largent is assistant professor of Communication Studies at McPherson College, USA, and managing editor of the Popular Culture Studies Journal. Bertha Chin is lecturer in the School of Design and Arts at Swinburne University of Technology, Sarawak, and coeditor of Crowdfunding the Future: Media Industries, Ethics and Digital Society. She has published extensively in fan and celebrity studies and is a board member of the UK-based Fan Studies Network. She is also interested in coffee culture and Sarawak heritage.

1. Introduction: Food Culture and Fandom 2. Food Studies: The Language and Narratives That Define Us 3. Food and Fandom: A Folklorist Food Studies Perspective 4. In Search of "Hestonthusiasts": Heston Blumenthal's Liminal Celebrity Chef Status and Hybridized Fan Practices 5. Poaching from the Preserves: Navigating the Food Network's Nomadic Fandom 6. Food Poisoning: The Rick and Morty Szechuan Sauce Debacle and the Temporalities of Toxic Fandom 7. Learning How to Cook Without Lifting a Knife: Food Television, Foodies, and Food Literacy 8. A Layover of Food: Understanding Anthony Bourdain's Approach of Describing Cultures through Culinary Interactions and Journalism 9. Consuming Butlers and Curry Buns: Cooking, Becoming, and Desiring with Black Butler 10. The Promise of Cake: Food Fandoms, Tourism, and Baking Practices Inspired by Portal 11. Making and Marketing Fan Food and Drink: Immersion and Transformative Work 12. The "Eatymologies" of the Theme Park: Re-creation, Imagination, and the "Extra/Ordinary" in Disney Foodstuff 13. Taste Culture: Fan Food as Sensorial Play and Pilgrimage 14. Procaffeinating: Mapping Coffee Fandom Via Social Media 15. For the Love of Beer: Craft Beer Fandom