Talk:Romance Scholarship

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  • Re the entry for ;Ang, Ien, 2003. : 'Living Room Wars: Rethinking Audiences for a Postmodern World', in The Audience Studies Reader, ed. Will Brooker and Deborah Jermyn (London, England: Routledge), pp. 226-34

Is this an extract from the same author's book of the same name, Living Room Wars; Rethinking Media Audiences for a Postmodern World, published in 1996? In that book there's a chapter on 'Feminist Desire and Female Pleasure: On Janice Radway's Reading the Romance'. Please could you give a small description of the aspect of romance fiction covered by the entry by Ien Ang in The Audience Studies Reader as it isn't clear from the title alone.

  • It may be the same item. I identified the essay from the MLA Biliography and the subject descriptors were: popular romance fiction; theories of Radway, Janice A. (1949- ): Reading the Romance. Since it referenced Radway I thought it would be appropriate to include. However, I don't have an abstract of it.
  • Ok, well how about I add in the reference to the whole book, which was published first, giving the details for the chapter that's about Radway. I've been putting a ** beside all the entries I haven't personally looked at, so that people are aware that the entry may not be entirely correct (or relevant, although most of them it's fairly easy to tell from the title whether they are or not). If we put a ** beside this entry, that should give people fair warning. Have you been using the ** for other entries you've taken from the MLA Bibliography? In most cases it won't matter, because the entry will be correct and relevant, but I've been erring on the side of caution. Does that seem over-cautious to you? I was being extra-careful because sometimes when people say 'romance' they really mean 'romantic', or they might be talking about Radway, but in terms of her methodology as it relates to cultural studies or something, rather than it having much to do with romance (there's one entry like that). So that's why I was being careful, but I could remove the **s if they're not really needed.
  • Sounds like a good idea to just reference the whole book. I haven't been putting in the ** for those I added - just slipped up on that. Everything I have added has been based on items identified in a variety of different databases that I searched so I haven't actually seen them. However, for the most part these citations are reliable. Personally, I think we could do without the **.
  • OK, I've now taken out the bit about 'Living Room Wars: Rethinking Audiences for a Postmodern World', in The Audience Studies Reader, ed. Will Brooker and Deborah Jermyn (London, England: Routledge, 2003), pp. 226-34 and put in the details for his book. If that's fine with you, we can delete this bit of the 'editing talk now'.


  • Re the entry for Charles, Helen, 1995. : '(Not) Compromising: Inter-Skin Colour Relations', in Romance Revisited , ed. Jackie Stacey and Lynne Pearce (New York: New York UP), pp. 197-209.

The author says that she looks at 'inter-skin colour relations in the television programme Taboo (1993) along with Barbara Burford's novella, The Threshing Floor (1986) and Ann Allen Shockley's The Mistress and the Slave Girl (1987)'. She does say that the last has a happy ending, but the first seems to be a documentary programme and I'm not sure about the Burford, so I'm wondering if this is more about romance than about romance novels?

  • This is another I found in the MLA. The descriptors here were:Shockley, Ann Allen (1927- ); primary subject Work: The Mistress and the Slave Girl (1987); Genre: fiction; popular romance fiction. However, it may not be on target enough. Perhaps this one should be removed?
  • I think maybe it should. It's not as though there aren't other entries which come from the same book, so if people get hold of the book, they'll find this one. On the other hand, it is one of the few entries that deals with black women and lesbian relationships, and there aren't a lot of those (and I don't think any of the others are about romances between lesbians of different ethnic groups), so maybe we should leave it in for that reason, as it might be helpful for people looking for something about those areas. Hmm. What do you think? I'm not sure. Maybe we should just leave it and let other people make their minds up? I could add a short description in square brackets - maybe that would be a good compromise?
  • I like the compromise idea.
  • I've put the description in a square bracket after the entry. If that's fine with you, then we can delete this bit of the 'editing talk' too.
  • Should dissertations be added to this bibiography? Strictly speaking they aren't books or articles, but there are several out there covering the topic. And often initial work in an area is reflected in dissertations.
  • They can be hard to get hold of (compared to published books or journal articles), but yes, I suppose they could be useful. We could have a separate page for them. That might be the best way to include them. Does that sound like a good idea to you?


  • This sounds like a good idea. Even if the dissertation itself is hard to get, the abstracts are pretty widely available.
  • Right, I've put in a link at the top of the page. It just needs someone to click on the link and start making entries. If you're happy with the wording we can delete this bit of the 'editing talk'.
  • Another thought - what about non-English language items. I've only come across a few so far.
  • They'd be good. I haven't come across any, though, but that could be due to the searches I've been doing. Another problem is definitions. I don't know exactly what's covered by the Spanish term 'novela rosa'. Maybe this is the sort of thing that you'd find easier to do on your databases. We could set up yet another page for any non-English-language items, particularly if they're dealing with romance novels that aren't written in English. What do you think?
  • Christina, you said that 'Everything I have added has been based on items identified in a variety of different databases that I searched so I haven't actually seen them. However, for the most part these citations are reliable. Personally, I think we could do without the **.'

I've been searching the internet, which I think may well be less accurate at times (depending on the source) than academic databases, so that's why I'm being so cautious. I have come across errors, and some of the entries I've put in don't have complete page-references. I wouldn't want to enforce the use of ** on anyone else, but I'd like to carry on using them myself. I was hoping that other people would come along who had seen the items, and that they'd then remove the **. I wonder what other people think. I'm not sure if other people have actually noticed the 'editing talk' page yet. Maybe Eric will come in here sometime and give us his opinion. I'll leave them in for the time-being, but if they're really annoying you or anyone else I can easily take them out.

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