"YouTube Shakespeares" is a study of Shakespeare online videos and the people who create, upload, and view them on YouTube. Employing an interdisciplinary approach, this work is a remix of theories and methodologies from literary, performance, (social) media, fan, and Internet studies that expands the field of Shakespeare studies. This…
"YouTube Shakespeares" is a study of Shakespeare online videos and the people who create, upload, and view them on YouTube. Employing an interdisciplinary approach, this work is a remix of theories and methodologies from literary, performance, (social) media, fan, and Internet studies that expands the field of Shakespeare studies. This dissertation explores the role of YouTube users and their activities, the expansion of literary research methods onto digital media venues, YouTube as site of Shakespeare performance, and YouTube Shakespeares' fan communities. It analyzes a broad array of Shakespeare visual performances including professional and user-generated mashups, remixes, film clips, auditions, and high school performances. A rich avenue for the study of people's viewing and reception of Shakespeare, YouTube tests the (un)limitations of Shakespeare adaptation. This work explores the ethical implications of researching performances that include human subjects, arguing that their presence frequently complicates common concepts of public and private identities. Although YouTube is a "published" forum for social interactivity and video repository, this work urges digital humanities scholars to recognize and honor the human users entailed in the videos not as text, but as human subjects. Shifting the study focus to human subjects demands a revision of research methods and publications protocols as the researcher repositions herself into the role of virtual ethnographer. "YouTube Shakespeares" develops its own ethics-based, online research method, which includes seeking Institutional Board Review approval and online interviews. The second half of the dissertation shifts from methodology to theorizing YouTube Shakespeares' performance spaces as analogs to the interactive and imaginary areas of Shakespeare's early modern theatre. Additionally, this work argues that YouTube Shakespeares' creators and commentators are fans. "YouTube Shakespeares" is one of the first Shakespeare-centric studies to employ fan studies as a critical lens to explore the cultural significance and etiquette of people's online Shakespeare performance activities. The work ends with a conversation about the issues of ephemerality, obsolescence, and concerns about the instability of digital and online materials, noting the risk of evidentiary loss of research materials is far outweighed by a scholarly critical registration of YouTube in the genealogy of Shakespeare performance.
This thesis focuses on ethics and explains some of its features, specifically the concept of moral consideration, rights, and interests, through three leading ethical theories in the field, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, and duty ethics. In this framework, environmental ethics is explored through three popular theories in the community, anthropocentrism, non-anthropocentrism,…
This thesis focuses on ethics and explains some of its features, specifically the concept of moral consideration, rights, and interests, through three leading ethical theories in the field, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, and duty ethics. In this framework, environmental ethics is explored through three popular theories in the community, anthropocentrism, non-anthropocentrism, and holism. Furthermore, organisational ethics is discussed in the context of environmental ethics through a case study of America’s famous coffee giant Starbucks. The coffee company is used to discuss business ethics and explores some of the practices already implemented, what works, what does not, what can be done, and the critical role its members play. Moreover, the thesis argues that environmental ethics is necessary to address and mitigate sustainability challenges and create models of business that consider the natural world in its entirety.
