Revised Draft of AB Ethnography Now Available

[ReiTheJelly]

Definitely interesting to read through the new 29-page version. I can't wait to see it published.

[sensei]

Good news: the essay, with some final clarifications and additions (a bit explaining what "Rubberslug" was and how it fit into the picture was inadvertently omitted and needed to be reinstated), now has gone back to the editor and will go in the next few days to the press for review. That doesn't mean publication is imminent -- the press's readers will have their say and so there may be yet one more major revision in the works. But it does mean that there is now a book and not just a proposal for one. I will keep Beta members informed about how things go from there.

Meantime, members will be interested in the editor's reaction:

Throughout all of the 16000+ words in your chapter you’ve managed to present a cohesive and truly beautiful narrative of anime (broadly), art collecting (as a specific locus for symbolic interaction and community-building through mutual exchanges over aligning interests), and the Anime-Beta community (specifically). I walked away from your essay with new insights into how and why collecting cels is so revered among anime art collectors (while also serving as a means of therapy and fetishistic, fantastical power in possessing new art).

But more than that, I learned a tremendous amount about the dynamics of a unique virtual community that is comprised of individuals who have to strike a balance between fostering relationships and fulfilling their own intrinsic desires relating to their hobby. I think readers will love the complex layers of interaction--the dynamics of interaction and the gestures of restitution in helping to keep the community peacefully together, despite the inherent competition--it all makes for a wonderfully compelling read and is one of the most complete, honest, and thorough ethnographic essays (both for in-person as well as online contexts) that I’ve read in a very, very long time.

I hope that the Betarians love it as much as I did.

Heh. The old man's not ready for the Bingo room yet.

[Keropi]

Sounds very good. Congratulations on your progress so far.

[iceman57]

This is this kind of message that enlights rainy days.
He deserves to get a free cel gift,... to start collecting!

[sensei]

My editor adds

And you are most welcome for any part I had in your success with this essay. I'm also glad that you've listed the Betarians at the end of the essay as you've woven them so seamlessly into the overarching narrative, that they've become pseudo-co-authors, which is a hard feat to pull off.

I agree that he deserves a token of gratitude ("the first one is always free...") and have checked to see what he might like to own -- cel, sketch, or bg. The cels are nice, but tempermental, while the others are potentially frameable. I've gifted a few of my supportive folklore friends with some of the latter over the years.

I'll keep everyone posted on the aftermath. Hopefully the essay will get printed without much further ado, as I think between the two of us it is now in very good shape stylistically. For the rest, the future will tell how widely it is read and used. I've found some things I wrote at speed and placed in out-of-the-way journals getting a surprising amount of traffic, while things I put a lot of time into and put in more respectable journals are just lines on my vita. I think this one will get read, though.

[Grico]

Wow this sounds really interesting. Is there still somewhere we can download this? If you don't mind me asking, what journal is going to published in? I am a researcher in the psychology and management fields, so I know the review and publishing process is long and tough.

[ginga123]

great and congratulations! i'm almost done reading it.

[sensei]

The Sendspace version is expired, but I can send a .pdf to anyone interested. PM me an e-mail address. After the hurricane, of course, and assuming my laptop survives.

It's slated to appear in a book of academic essays titled Folk Culture in the Digital Age, edited by Trevor J. Blank and (if all goes well) published by Utah State University Press. Hopefully about this time next year.