Mathieu Berbiguier

November 3, 2023

Mathieu Berbiguier is a PhD candidate in Korean Studies (Asian Languages and Cultures) at UCLA, currently (hopefully) wrapping up. He has been a K-pop fan for 15 years. During that time, he was always interested in observing how other people were enjoying it but also in self-reflecting on his stances and experiences as a K-pop fan who lived in France, Korea, and the US. This inspired the focus of his thesis that tries to assert K-pop as a relevant object of study in Korean Studies (it may sound obvious for people outside the field, but it’s not!) by looking at the power dynamics between K-pop fans inside AND outside Korea. Even though he loves fandom and fandom studies, he cannot say...

Kathryn Hemmann

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Kathryn Hemmann is a Lecturer of Japanese Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Their research on social issues in popular media has been published in peer-reviewed journals such as Games and Culture and Transformative Works and Cultures, as well as academic essay collections such as Woke Gaming and Gender and Contemporary Horror. Their 2020 monograph, Manga Cultures and the Female Gaze, traces the influence of manga on contemporary North American comics. Kathryn has contributed essays and book reviews to online magazines such as Women Write About Comics, Unwinnable, and Cosmic Double, and their fiction and comics have appeared in numerous venues, including fandom anthologies and self-published zines. They run a blog at DigitalFantasyDiary.com , and they tweet @kathrynthehuman ....

Jaroslav Švelch

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Jaroslav Švelch is associate professor of media studies at Charles University, Prague. He has published work on history and theory of computer games, and on humor in games and social media. In his first monograph Gaming the Iron Curtain: How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed the Medium of Computer Games (MIT Press, 2018), he traces the hidden histories of home computing and gaming in the former Soviet bloc. The book has earned the Computer History Museum Prize for 2019. His most recent book Player Vs. Monster: The Making and Breaking of Video Game Monstrosity (MIT Press, 2023) offers a cultural history and a critique of monstrous antagonists in computer and video games. He is currently researching the practices...

Victor Dandridge

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Writer. Publisher. Graphic Designer. Educator. Victor Dandridge is a leading, new voice for innovation and production within the self-publishing market. He’s found acclaim with his own imprint, Vantage:Inhouse Productions, the weekly internet review series, Black, White & Read All Over, as well as being a featured moderator and pop culture commentator at conventions across the country. Wanting not only to entertain, but also to educate, Victor launched his U Cre-8 Comics line – a unique bridge between comics and classroom fundamentals. In 2021, he inked a 1st Look Exclusive deal with Aha Media™, a multimedia development firm. Together, they aim to bring properties like WONDER CARE PRESENTS: THE KINDER GUARDIANS, THE TROUBLE W/LOVE, and THE SAMARITAN to film, television, and animation outlets...

Benjamin Woo

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Benjamin Woo is Associate Professor of Communication and Media Studies in the School of Journalism and Communication at Carleton University (Ottawa, Canada), where he directs the Research on Comics, Con Events, and Transmedia Laboratory. Ben is the author of Getting a Life: The Social Worlds of Geek Culture, co-author of The Greatest Comic Book of All Time: Symbolic Capital and the Field of American Comic Books, and co-editor of The Comics World: Comics, Graphic Novels, and Their Publics, among other works....

Panda Moanyum

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Panda has been writing fanfic since she discovered what a lemon was among the Sailor Moon webrings of yore in the age of dial-up. She believes there's no age limit on being an anime nerd and spends most of her time reading and watching shoujo and josei while penning dirty, often problematic smut for My Hero Academia. She's a former member of the Romance Writers of America and knows a thing or two about crafting a romance and writing sexy, intimate scenes. When Panda isn't neck-deep in fandom, you can find her working on her debut rom-com fantasy novel or playing sudoku while listening to fun and (you guessed it) filthy audiobooks. ...

Zsófia Nemesi

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Zsófia Nemesi is a PhD student at Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) in Budapest, Hungary. She is interested in transcultural media fandom from an interdisciplinary perspective. She is currently doing research into language play, translanguaging and linguistic identity in fannish spaces....

Erika Ningxin Wang

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Erika Ningxin Wang is an Assistant Professor in Public Policy and Media Studies at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen Campus. She earned her PhD degree in Culture, Media, and Creative Industries from King’s College London, UK. Her research interests include fan studies, cross-cultural migration of popular culture, consumers of creative industries, social media governance, activism, and censorship....

Claudie Arseneault

by jasmine

November 2, 2023

Claudie Arseneault is an easily-enthused aromantic and asexual writer with a never-ending cycle of obsessions but an enduring love for all things cephalopod and fantasy (together or not!). She writes stories that centre platonic relationships and loves large casts and single-city settings, the most notable of which are the City of Spires series (2017-2023) and Baker Thief (2018). In addition to her own fiction, Claudie has co-edited Common Bonds (2021), an anthology of aromantic speculative short stories. She is a founding member of The Kraken Collective, an alliance of self-publishing SFF authors, and the creator of the Aromantic and Asexual Characters Database. Check out her website: http://claudiearseneault.com/ and her shop: https://gumroad.com/claudiearseneault...

Han Thar Htin

by jasmine

October 19, 2023

Han is from Myanmar(Burma). He came to the U.S. to study animation and graduated from SCAD with B.F.A in 2017. Check out his YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQtgdn4-Odyzw8KXlTWxSzg...