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In Popular Postcolonialisms: Discourses of Empire and Popular Culture, Nadia Atia and Kate Houlden parse the tensions, and compatibilities, between the broad, encompassing fields of “the postcolonial” and “the popular.” “In the present moment,” they observe, “postcolonial studies is undergoing a crisis in the status and direction of the discipline, which is reflected in the proliferation of labels such as ‘global fiction’ and ‘world literature’” (2)--formations, seemingly, ushering "the postcolonial" and "the popular" into relation. Yet, “postcolonial studies, with its roots and politics in the radical challenge to colonial and neocolonial power, has tended to overlook popular forms, often defined as low or middle-brow and commonly viewed as antithetical to resistance” (2). Given postcolonialism’s innate interest in class, intersectionality and the multiple axis of oppression and resilience, this overlooking, Atia and Houlden suggest, invites reconsideration.

For this third issue of Refractions, we echo Atia and Houlden’s query–“What is the place of the ‘popular’ in the postcolonial paradigm?” (3)–and look for responses in the field of popular culture. We draw inspiration from TV shows that appeared between 2020 and 2024, such as, but not limited to, Bridgerton (2020), Reservation Dogs (2021), Dealoch (2023) and True Detective (2024). One of the major critiques of Bridgeton has been that the show is ‘shallow’; the reviews from popular platforms such as Vox and Robert Ebert both associate ‘shallow’ with Bridgerton. Through this issue, we hope to theorize ‘shallowness’ and ‘the popular’. Does popularity and its associated ‘lightweightedness’’ discount their value as a site of analysis? Is it possible to leverage the lightweightedness to go beyond the insignificance associated with the popular? Since the popular is linked to mass consumption, while we concede that the popular might reflect the majoritarian perspective, we are interested in investigating how the popular can serve as a site to recount marginalized stories. In addition to narratives, in this issue, we hope to be attentive towards the representation of spaces and places enabled by this popular turn in the postcolonial. Consider, for example, the TV show Deadloch which parodies a police procedural while drawing attention to settler politics in Tasmania. The fourth season of True Detective does similar work, with its location in Alaska, weaving Indigenous elements into a police procedural, and thus illuminating the various jurisdictions, histories, and ways of knowing, vying for space within the show. To this end, we are looking for submissions that situate the popular in a field of power relations. Submissions could respond (but are certainly not limited) to the following prompts.

• The links between the need for representation and the popular turn in the postcolonial

• “The popular” as a manifestation of capitalist logics, profiting from the need for representation and marginalized stories

• Explorations of identities and historical inheritance, and their treatment in popular media

• The return to genre in the popular turn in the postcolonial (for example, the return of the western genre, in recent years, and the popularity of the sci-fi alien invasion narrative)

• Narrative techniques emerging through the overlaps of the popular and the postcolonial

• Modes of representation enabled by the popular turn in the postcolonial/postcolonial turn in the popular

• The relationship between the popular and spatial representation- which spaces are chosen to be represented and why? What does it say about the turn to ‘non-conventional spaces’ in contemporary TV? 

We are looking for submissions that approach these questions through unconventional formats. Send us your zines, collages, and short write-ups. In the spirit of the popular, and its emphasis on accessibility and wider audiences, we also welcome shorter, non academic and semi-academic pieces. For standard written submissions, please check our “Submission Guidelines” page (https://www.refractionsajournalofpostcolonialculturalcriticism.com/submi...). Please send your submissions to editors@refractionsajournalofpostcolonialculturalcriticism.com by 15 July, 2024.