Research Log One
Potential Worlds to Explore
This entry is my second short video using Canva and a little cartoon persona designed on a Picrew avatar-maker created by username "Potato Lord. "Click the link below the first picture to watch the video (due to its data size, it was not able to fit on this website). All the images in the video are taken either from Canva or from Google, and I took the photo of the warm toned library seen below. Creating these videos requires a lot of patience in moving around the avatar one frame at a time, but the character and the digital world they inhabit it like its own mini-world, which to me is worth it. This is also my attempt to imitate professional YouTube personalities who use avatars in their videos to communicate to their audience in a more artistic way.
Research Log Transcript
Hi everyone, I’m back in another video! I didn’t realize when I made my Winter Quarter reflection that I would be making another little short, but here we are. This video is going to be shorter and admittedly less visually active than the five minute one I made last semester, but only because this is going to be one of five short research logs. Today, we’ll be exploring potential primary sources for my Spring Research paper.
I’ve already discussed a lot of my ideas for the Spring Research project in the previous video, such as the art of the Dutch Golden Age, queer graphic novels, and modern portrayals of pirates. However, in this entry I’m going to narrow down some of my areas of interest and more thoroughly brainstorm their potential worldbuilding topics. The more I think about which the primary sources I could choose, the more there seem to be; however I’ve noticed that many of my interests contain similar themes of queer experiences and safe spaces. Whether the author is LGBTQ+, the text centers queer characters, or both, I inadvertently ended up with many potential sources from a mix of genres that are all still LGBTQ+ dominated, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
My current pool of options includes a graphic novel, a Disney animated series, playscripts, songs and their music videos, and physical paintings, but I’m really only going to talk about the graphic novel and the Disney animated series. I’m mostly interested in fictional entertainment media, and in particular with LGBTQ+ spaces and inclusive worlds that take inspiration from established genres such as sci-fi or gothic fantasy that haven’t always been queer friendly. Further, since many of these sources have been created recently, it’s interesting to see how they draw on and subvert common entertainment tropes.
For example, in Disney’s hit fantasy cartoon series The Owl House, the main character believes that she is meant to fill the “Chosen One” role common in fantasy entertainment, but quickly learns, in the most disillusioning way possible, that this “Chosen One” role is too idyllic to exist in her less than perfect world. There’s also a lot of quips making fun of the cliches seen in magic-centered blockbusters like the Harry Potter franchise. Similar to this, sci-fi and space-opera graphic novel On a Sunbeam innocuously omits male characters from its story, a change that is remarkable in a genre that is heavily populated by male characters. I love how this graphic novel and cartoon continue to draw on historically popular genres to create worlds that are accessible to a wider range of audiences while also being able to critique the cliches and past practices of their respective genres. With analyzing a piece like one of these, I can look at the background of the entertainment genre, what the text praises and criticizes about it, and how it envisions the future of the genre.
On the other hand, with a more historical text like Oscar Wilde’s playscripts, I can look at how the plays’ comedy shaped sitcoms and other comedic film today. His plays may not provide much in the way of LGBTQ+ representation, but he is a queer creator and it shows in his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. I’d love to talk about the book; its Gothicism, Parisian and Greek influences, the lavish world created by imagery of both urbanism and nature, the destitute and materialistic, but The Picture of Dorian Gray is a very popular book with much written about it. If I was to make it the focus of my research, I’d have to find a slightly new interpretation about the significance or method of its worldbuilding.
In conclusion, I still have a bit to choose from, but I do feel very passionate about LGBTQ+ inclusive content in recent media, and I’d enjoy showing how some traditional genres in entertainment are being revamped to reflect their audience better while still providing a surreal, escapist reality.
