Media literacy, fandom and participative cultures. A global challenge

Abstract

Conceptual review of the phenomenon Fandom (Fan Kingdom), which addresses how research in fandom has evolved from audience studies and reception to those positions that analyze the complex participatory culture (especially children) through communication technologies.The article explains how Fandom has begun to be taken into account by researchers such as Henry Jenkins, renowned for his research on the effects of media convergence on users; or by James Paul Gee, an expert on the subject of videogames. The concepts of "participative culture" and "affinity" used for each one of them respectively, are recovered to define new ways in which users are related to the media, and to each other in a context mediated by technologies; and to try to explain the new ways children learn that, in addition to school and parents, they learn from the new media, which are sources of knowledge increasingly crucial.