Welcome to Why Do I Love This? A podcast where we examine how concepts, objects, activities and ideologies become foundational to the human experience.
I'm posting this whole first episode as a trailer of sorts.
In the main episodes of the show, I will be speaking to a guest, maybe subject, who has a concept, object, activity or ideology that is deeply important to them across two interviews. The first will be fact finding, learning about them and their topic in as much detail as possible. Then I will go away and do as much research into the psychology and philosophy of why they have come to love that topic.
But as I've never made anything like this before, I've done this first episode about me, and something that I love. Something that has been important to me since childhood, and that really might have helped to save my life. I'm really grateful to have you here as we try to work out, Why Do I Love Luke Skywalker?
Huge thank you to Ben Rogers, Assistant Professor of Management & Organization at the Carroll School of Management of Boston College, for his generosity and taking the time to talk through his recently published study on The Hero's Journey.
Drew Toynbee
I am a freelance creative from the UK, using my skills developed as an actor in another life to create video and audio content either for myself, like this, or for clients ranging from the wedding industry to Space Lawyers (I'm not kidding, it's wild).
Contact
I would be thrilled to hear from you if you have any feedback on the show, or just want to say hello! In the social media space I'm most active on Threads, but you can also find me on Instagram, less and less on Twitter, or even on my poor, neglected website.
Guest Enquiries
If you have a concept, object, activity or ideology that is deeply important to you, and you'd be interested in appearing on a future episode of this show, then you can fill in this form. I will do my best to get back to everyone, although I will only make an episode on something that I'm confident I can do deep enough research on to do it justice.
Credits
This show and its music are all written, performed, edited and produced by me, Drew Toynbee, with support from Expanded Universe.
The show is also kindly supported and hosted by the wonderful people at Captivate.fm, and if you're serious about producing a podcast as an independent, you should check them out immediately.
Supporting the show
If you really enjoyed the show enough to be reading this deep in the show notes, if you want and are able to, you can leave me a tip!Support Why Do I Love This?
Research Links
Below are links to most of the sources that I used in researching this episode
- Parasocial Relationships with Fictional Characters in in Therapy - Kathleen Gannon
The more you watch something, the more you connect with the characters. Repeated viewing as a child.
"Development of parasocial relationships. This first subsection is on the development of
a parasocial relationship. There is discussion on how these relationships are formed by
individuals with their favorite media characters. The relationship can be built through multiple
viewings (Kokesh & Sternadori, 2015; Branch et al., 2013), through parasocial interactions
(Branch et al., 2013), and by familiarity of the same characters in a new form of the media (Hall,
2017).
Audiences create intimate relationships with media characters in a parasocial relationship
(Kokesh & Sternadori, 2015). Since the audience can see and learn about the character’s whole
story and life, it is almost like having a friend that confides in them and lives alongside them.
These characters can evoke different emotions when they feel familiar to the spectators
consuming the media (Hall, 2017).
The characters can become more familiar if their stories are viewed frequently. People
have relationships with things that they encounter in their daily lives (Banks, & Bowman, 2016).
Since media consumption is part of the daily lives of many people, it is possible for them to
create a relationship with at least one character. Some people have rituals revolving around
consuming media, such as watching an episode (or a few) of a favorite show on Netflix to
decompress from the work day. Another is catching up on a show when it has a new episode
released to avoid spoilers."
"When this relationship is built over time, the audience might believe that they can predict the behaviour of the character (Branch et al., 2013). This could account for people that watch the same piece of media repeatedly and can quote each line as they watch it. Also, when new content is released, the audience will try to guess what the character is going to do next in their story arc
"It's aimed at kids - the kid in everybody": George Lucas, Star Wars and Children's Entertainment - Peter Krämer, University of East Anglia, UK, 2004The framing is very much the same as a fairytale
The opening crawl is purposefully reminiscent of 'once upon a time'
Even having such a large swathe of text at the beginning is intentionally positioned to ensure that a parent or older sibling needs to read it to them.
Star wars: The hidden empire - Like the Western, Star Wars uses apolitical individualism to portray political actions as the result of individuals' search for freedom, while representing the galaxy as home to a single, evil Empire. These narrative mechanisms, invite the viewers of Star Wars to think of the United States as a ragtag group of fighters battling an oppressive empire, but not itself an empire.Personality perception in Game of Thrones: Character consensus and assumed similarity. - “It would suggest that people do form parasocial relationships with these characters, and it’s probably because they see more of their personality traits reflected in those characters,” Webster said. “Which means, if they like the character, it’s because of what they see of themselves.”The Psychology of Character Bonding: Why We Feel a Real Connection to Actors - The CreditsWhat Is Character Bonding? Exploring the Connection We Feel With Fictional Characters on Screen and in Novels | ThriveworksTEENAGERS, FANDOM, AND IDENTITYUnderstanding Fandom: An Introduction to the Study of Media Fan Culture - Mark Duffett - Google Books - p123 - How do people become fans?Seeing your life story as a Hero's Journey increases meaning in life - PubMed - Rogers BA, Chicas H, Kelly JM, Kubin E, Christian MS, Kachanoff FJ, Berger J, Puryear C, McAdams DP, Gray K. Seeing your life story as a Hero's Journey increases meaning in life. J Pers Soc Psychol. 2023 Oct;125(4):752-778. doi: 10.1037/pspa0000341. Epub 2023 Mar 27. PMID: 36972106.The Psychological Value of Applying the Hero’s Journey to Your Life | TIMECopyright 2024 Drew Toynbee
