Dr. Melissa A. Click's research interests center on popular culture texts and audiences, particularly texts and audiences disdained in mainstream culture. Her work in this area is guided by audience studies; theories of gender, race, and sexuality; and...
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Tuesday: 8:30am -10:30am
Thursday: 12:30pm - 2:30pm
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Ph.D., Communication, University of Massachusetts
M.A, Communication, University of Massachusetts
B.B.A, Marketing, James Madison University
COMM 100 Communication and Speech
COMM 193 First Year Seminar: Intergroup Dialogue
COMM 370 Digital Cultures/Networked Selves
COMM 484 Senior Seminar
Dr. Melissa A. Click's research interests center on popular culture texts and audiences, particularly texts and audiences disdained in mainstream culture. Her work in this area is guided by audience studies; theories of gender, race, and sexuality; and media literacy. Recent research projects involve NFL fans, the impact of social media in fans’ relationships with celebrities, negative emotions and fandom, and the inevitable changes fans experience in their fandom over time.
Her scholarship has been published in Television & New Media, Communication, Culture & Critique, the International Journal of Cultural Studies, Men & Masculinities, Popular Communication, Popular Music & Society, and Transformative Works & Cultures.
She is the editor of Dislike, Hate, and Anti-fandom in the Digital Age (NYU, 2019) and the co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Media Fandom (2018) and Bitten by Twilight (Peter Lang, 2010).
Edited Books:
Click, M. A. (2019). Dislike, hate, and anti-fandom in the digital age. New York University Press.
Click, M. A. and Scott, S. (2018). The Routledge companion to media fandom. Routledge.
Click, M. A., Aubrey, J. S., and Behm-Morawitz, E. (Eds.). (2010). Bitten by Twilight: Youth culture, media, and the vampire franchise. New York: Peter Lang.
Refereed Journal Articles:
Click, M.A., Egdar, A. N., and Holladay, H. W. (accepted). Race talk, fandom, and the legacy of plantation culture in the NFL player protests. Journal of International and Intercultural Communication.
Click, M. A., & Smith-Frigerio, S. (2019). One Tough Cookie: Exploring Black Women’s Responses to Empire’s Cookie Lyon. Communication, Culture & Critique. doi: 10.1093/ccc/tcz007
Aubrey, J. S., Click, M. A., & Behm-Morawitz, E. (in press). The Twilight of youth: Understanding feminism and romance in Twilight Moms' connection to the young-adult vampire series. Psychology of Popular Media Culture 7, 61-71.
Click, M. A., *Lee, H., & *Holladay, H. W., & (2017). “You’re born to be brave”: Lady Gaga’s use of social media to inspire fans’ political awareness. International Journal of Cultural Studies. doi: 10.1177/1367877915595893
Click, M. A., *Miller, B., Behm-Morawitz, E & Aubrey, J.S. (2016). Twi- dudes and Twi-guys: How male fans of Twilight interpret and engage with a feminized text. Men and Masculinities, 19.3, 219+239. doi: 10.1177/1097184X15575159
*Walus, S. & Click, M. A. (2016). “I can’t think of a more unlikely rock star than me”: Exploring “averageness” in the myth of rock and roll. Rock Music Studies, 3, 248-265. doi: 10.1080/19401159.2015.1112106
Click, M. A., *Holladay, H. W., *Lee, H., & *Kristiansen, L. J. (2015). “Let's hug it out, bitch”: Audience response to hegemonic masculinity in Entourage. Television & New Media, 6, 403-421. doi: 10.1177/1527476414532140
Click, M. A., *Lee, H., & *Holladay, H. W. (2013). Making monsters: Lady Gaga, fan identification, and social media. Popular Music & Society, 6(3), 360-379. doi: 10.1080/03007766.2013.798546
Aubrey, J. S., Behm-Morawitz, E., & Click, M. A. (2010). The romanticization of abstinence: Fan response to sexual restraint in the Twilight series. Transformative Works & Culture, 5. Available at:
Click, M. A., & Ridberg, R. (2010). Saving food: Finding the politics of the everyday in food preservation. Environmental Communication, 4, 301-317.
Edited Journal Issue:
Press, A. and Click, M. A. (2015). The future of feminist media studies. The Communication Review, 18.
Journal Editor:
Communication, Culture & Critique. March 2021-December 2024 (Issues 14.1-17.4)
Book Chapters:
Click, M. A. (2023). [Review of the book Dislike-Minded]. Transformative Works & Cultures, 39. DOI:
Click, M. A., Egdar, A. N., and Holladay, H. W. (2020). NFL broadcasts: Interpretive communities. In. J. Mittell and E. Thompson (Eds.), How to watch television, 2nd edition. New York: New York University Press. 363-371.
Click, M. A., & *Holladay, H. W. (2018). Breaking up with Breaking Bad: Viewers’ perspectives on morality and finality in the critically-acclaimed AMC series. In R. Williams (Ed.) Transitions, endings, & resurrections in fandom. University of Iowa Press. 61-73.
Click, M. A. (2017). Do all “good things” come to an end? Revisiting Martha Stewart fans after Alderson. In J. Gray, C. Sandvoss, & C. L. Harrington (Eds.), Fandom: Identities and communities in a mediated world, 2nd edition. New York: New York University Press. 191-204.
Click, M. A., & *Brock, N. (2016). Marking the line between producers and fans: Representations of fannish-ness in Doctor Who and Sherlock. In L. Bennett & P. Booth (Eds.), Representations of fandom in media and popular culture. New York: Bloomsbury. 117-126.
Click, M. A. (2015). Fifty Shades of postfeminism: Contextualizing readers’ reflections on the erotic romance series. In E. Levine (Ed.) Cupcakes, Pinterest, Ladyporn: Feminized Popular Culture in the Early 21st Century. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. 15-31.