What is it about?
Through autoethnographic reflections, we explore how Swift’s collective, intergenerational appeal is sustained through our connection to her and our intimacies. We consider how people and communities may connect with Swift as a phenomenon, person, and artist.
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Photo by Grigorii Shcheglov on Unsplash
Why is it important?
Through her songwriting, Swift shares vulnerability, complexity, and a sense of intimacy. We engage with Berlant’s (1998, p. 282) work on intimacy, which “builds worlds; it creates spaces and usurps places meant for other kinds of relation”. In reflecting on Swift’s relation to intimate publics, we consider how her listeners' emotional responses generate an intimate space. Our navigation of listeners and/or fans as forming intimate publics creates new understandings of intimacy.
Perspectives
We arrived at this research and the resulting chapter with different perspectives. One of us was a longtime listener, two of us had engaged with Swift's works more recently, and the youngest of us was an up-and-coming pre-tween fangirl. In this chapter we explore different perspectives, experiences, memories, and wonderings about Swift and how intimate connections are formed with her and her works.
Associate Professor Madeleine Rose Dobson
Curtin University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: The Power of the Intimate, May 2025, Taylor & Francis,
DOI: 10.4324/9781003509271-8.
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