Tanner Mirrlees
Biographic Data
| ID | 707563 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Tanner Mirrlees |
| GIVEN NAMES | Tanner |
| FAMILY NAME | Mirrlees |
| SIGNATURE | MIRRLEES T |
| AFFILIATIONS | Ontario Tech University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9597-8313 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 16 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 6 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 16 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2009 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
The creator function, post-structuralism, and the perils of terminological dissonance
A broadly interdisciplinary field is emerging to study creators, referred to as “creator studies”, “platforms and cultural production studies”, “influencer studies”, and “ wanghong studies”. Yet the subject of this field—the creator—is still in the process of “being born” or constructed. The definition of the creator that will inevitably stabilize and be governmentalized remains uncertain and contested, shaped by corporations, states, scholars, a…
Redesigning Success: How Post-Growth Economics Can Reshape the Games Industry
The Making of Marxism Today: Cultural-Materialist Insights for Democratic Socialist Media Creators
Google’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Policy and “EDI Solutionism: An Intersectional Feminist Political Economy Analysis
Background: This article applies an intersectional feminist political economy approach to examine the contexts and conditions of Google’s equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) policy. Analysis: Google’s EDI policy framework is interpreted as a strategic response to criticisms of the inequities and oppressions surrounding Google’s work and labour conditions, technological products, and social power. Conclusions and implications: There are notable…
Ten postulates of a media imperialism framework: For critical research on China’s media power and influence in the Global South
This article considers the growing media power and influence of China in the global South through the lens of a critical media imperialism framework derived from the geopolitical economy of communications research tradition. While extensive research exists on US media imperialism and the challenge to it posed by China’s global media rise, the idea of China as a media imperialist in its own right has received limited attention. This article addres…
The Socialist Project on Social Media Platforms: Anticapitalist Organization in Platform Capitalism
This article is a self-reflexive case study of the Socialist Project's (SP) tactical uses of Meta's Facebook and Google's YouTube platforms. Formed in early 2003 by Leo Panitch (1945-2020), Greg Albo, Sam Gindin, Herman Rosenfeld, and others, the SP is a small Toronto-based democratic socialist organization that for nearly two decades has contributed to wider efforts to build and sustain an anticapitalist "infrastructure of dissent" and "radical …
The Virtual Killing of Muslims: Digital War Games, Islamophobia, and the Global War on Terror
This article argues that digital war games communicate misleading stereotypes about Muslims that prop up patriarchal militarism and Islamophobia in the context of the US-led Global War on Terror. The article's first section establishes the relevance of the study of digital war games to feminist games studies, feminist international relations, and post-colonial feminism. The second section contextualizes the contemporary production and consumption…
Tweeting #RemoveKebab: A Critical Study of the Far Right’s Islamophobic Hate Hashtag on Twitter
Background: To contribute to research on the transnational far right, Islamophobia, and social media platforms, this article interrogates the far right’s practice of using Twitter to produce and circulate a #removekebab hashtag. Analysis: The accounts behind the words and images of 100 #removekebab tweets are analyzed to show how they communicate the transnational far right’s hateful Islamophobic discourse. Conclusion and implications: The far ri…
The Alt-right's Discourse on "Cultural Marxism": A Political Instrument of Intersectional Hate
This article analyzes the history, production, circulation, and political uses of the alt-right’s discourse about cultural Marxism in the context of the right-wing populist Trump presidency, the rise of fascist movements in the United States and worldwide, and the politics of intersectional hate.
Exoskeletons, Transhumanism, and Culture: Performing Superhuman Feats
In this article we study how exoskeletons are construed through three dominant but interrelated presentations: 1) popular science journalism, 2) advertisements of military innovation, and 3) blockbuster science fiction film. We address how these media function to alter attitudes about the future. The attitudinal framing of the exoskeleton asks that people aspire to transhumanism, and that they “imagine the possibilities in the near future of dram…
TransformingTransformersinto Militainment: Interrogating the DoD-Hollywood Complex
This article examines how the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and Hollywood collaborated to manufacture the blockbuster filmsTransformers(T) andTransformers: Revenge of the Fallen(TRF) to sell in global marketsandto sell a positive image of DoD personnel, policy, technology, and practice to the world.TandTRFare global militainment films made by the "DoD-Hollywood complex" to make money in markets and put the U.S. military before the world in a p…
Hearts and Mines: The US Empire’s Culture Industry
From Katy Perry training alongside US Marines in a music video, to the global box-office mastery of the US military-supported Transformers franchise, to the explosion of war games such as Call of Duty, it’s clear that the US security state is a dominant force in media culture. But is the ubiquity of cultural products that glorify the security state a new phenomenon? Or have Uncle Sam and Hollywood been friends for a long time? Hearts and Mines ex…
Elysium as a critical dystopia
This article argues that Elysium communicates a ‘critical dystopia’ that illuminates and interrogates global capitalism’s worst social, political, ecological and technological conditions and shows them being resisted and changed, for the better. To this end, our article’s first section contextualizes Elysium by building upon recent studies of global Hollywood, the genre characteristics and politics of science fiction films and ‘critical dystopia’…
Reality TV’s Embrace of the Intern
In the preface to a seminal exposé of the “intern nation,” Ross Perlin (2012) writes, “reality TV truly embraces the intern” (xii). This article describes and analyzes how 20 reality TV intern job ads for 19 different reality TV studios represent the work of interns and internships in the capitalist reality TV industry. By interrogating how the job postings depict the work that reality TV studios expect interns to do, the skills that TV studios e…
Global Entertainment Media: Between Cultural Imperialism and Cultural Globalization
A critical cultural materialist introduction to the study of global entertainment media. In Global Entertainment Media, Tanner Mirrlees undertakes an analysis of the ownership, production, distribution, marketing, exhibition and consumption of global films and television shows, with an eye to political economy and cultural studies. Among other topics, Mirrlees examines: Paradigms of global entertainment media such as cultural imperialism and cult…
Digital militainment by design: Producing and playing Socom: U.S. Navy Seals
This article examines the nexus of global digital capitalism and US militarism in two popular war games: SOCOM I: Navy SEALs (SOCOM I) and SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs (SOCOM II). SOCOM supports digital capitalism's economic interests and the US military's promotional goals in four related contexts. In its production context, SOCOM is glocalized digital militainment that was synergistically co-produced by Sony Corporation (a media corporation, based…
TransformingTransformersinto Militainment: Interrogating the DoD-Hollywood Complex
This article examines how the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and Hollywood collaborated to manufacture the blockbuster filmsTransformers(T) andTransformers: Revenge of the Fallen(TRF) to sell in global marketsandto sell a positive image of DoD personnel, policy, technology, and practice to the world.TandTRFare global militainment films made by the "DoD-Hollywood complex" to make money in markets and put the U.S. military before the world in a p…
The Making of Marxism Today: Cultural-Materialist Insights for Democratic Socialist Media Creators
The Socialist Project on Social Media Platforms: Anticapitalist Organization in Platform Capitalism
This article is a self-reflexive case study of the Socialist Project's (SP) tactical uses of Meta's Facebook and Google's YouTube platforms. Formed in early 2003 by Leo Panitch (1945-2020), Greg Albo, Sam Gindin, Herman Rosenfeld, and others, the SP is a small Toronto-based democratic socialist organization that for nearly two decades has contributed to wider efforts to build and sustain an anticapitalist "infrastructure of dissent" and "radical …
Elysium as a critical dystopia
This article argues that Elysium communicates a ‘critical dystopia’ that illuminates and interrogates global capitalism’s worst social, political, ecological and technological conditions and shows them being resisted and changed, for the better. To this end, our article’s first section contextualizes Elysium by building upon recent studies of global Hollywood, the genre characteristics and politics of science fiction films and ‘critical dystopia’…
Digital militainment by design: Producing and playing Socom: U.S. Navy Seals
This article examines the nexus of global digital capitalism and US militarism in two popular war games: SOCOM I: Navy SEALs (SOCOM I) and SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs (SOCOM II). SOCOM supports digital capitalism's economic interests and the US military's promotional goals in four related contexts. In its production context, SOCOM is glocalized digital militainment that was synergistically co-produced by Sony Corporation (a media corporation, based…
Digital militainment by design: Producing and playing Socom: U.S. Navy Seals
This article examines the nexus of global digital capitalism and US militarism in two popular war games: SOCOM I: Navy SEALs (SOCOM I) and SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs (SOCOM II). SOCOM supports digital capitalism's economic interests and the US military's promotional goals in four related contexts. In its production context, SOCOM is glocalized digital militainment that was synergistically co-produced by Sony Corporation (a media corporation, based…
Global Entertainment Media: Between Cultural Imperialism and Cultural Globalization
A critical cultural materialist introduction to the study of global entertainment media. In Global Entertainment Media, Tanner Mirrlees undertakes an analysis of the ownership, production, distribution, marketing, exhibition and consumption of global films and television shows, with an eye to political economy and cultural studies. Among other topics, Mirrlees examines: Paradigms of global entertainment media such as cultural imperialism and cult…
Reality TV’s Embrace of the Intern
In the preface to a seminal exposé of the “intern nation,” Ross Perlin (2012) writes, “reality TV truly embraces the intern” (xii). This article describes and analyzes how 20 reality TV intern job ads for 19 different reality TV studios represent the work of interns and internships in the capitalist reality TV industry. By interrogating how the job postings depict the work that reality TV studios expect interns to do, the skills that TV studios e…
Hearts and Mines: The US Empire’s Culture Industry
From Katy Perry training alongside US Marines in a music video, to the global box-office mastery of the US military-supported Transformers franchise, to the explosion of war games such as Call of Duty, it’s clear that the US security state is a dominant force in media culture. But is the ubiquity of cultural products that glorify the security state a new phenomenon? Or have Uncle Sam and Hollywood been friends for a long time? Hearts and Mines ex…
Elysium as a critical dystopia
This article argues that Elysium communicates a ‘critical dystopia’ that illuminates and interrogates global capitalism’s worst social, political, ecological and technological conditions and shows them being resisted and changed, for the better. To this end, our article’s first section contextualizes Elysium by building upon recent studies of global Hollywood, the genre characteristics and politics of science fiction films and ‘critical dystopia’…
Exoskeletons, Transhumanism, and Culture: Performing Superhuman Feats
In this article we study how exoskeletons are construed through three dominant but interrelated presentations: 1) popular science journalism, 2) advertisements of military innovation, and 3) blockbuster science fiction film. We address how these media function to alter attitudes about the future. The attitudinal framing of the exoskeleton asks that people aspire to transhumanism, and that they “imagine the possibilities in the near future of dram…
TransformingTransformersinto Militainment: Interrogating the DoD-Hollywood Complex
This article examines how the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and Hollywood collaborated to manufacture the blockbuster filmsTransformers(T) andTransformers: Revenge of the Fallen(TRF) to sell in global marketsandto sell a positive image of DoD personnel, policy, technology, and practice to the world.TandTRFare global militainment films made by the "DoD-Hollywood complex" to make money in markets and put the U.S. military before the world in a p…
The Alt-right's Discourse on "Cultural Marxism": A Political Instrument of Intersectional Hate
This article analyzes the history, production, circulation, and political uses of the alt-right’s discourse about cultural Marxism in the context of the right-wing populist Trump presidency, the rise of fascist movements in the United States and worldwide, and the politics of intersectional hate.
The Virtual Killing of Muslims: Digital War Games, Islamophobia, and the Global War on Terror
This article argues that digital war games communicate misleading stereotypes about Muslims that prop up patriarchal militarism and Islamophobia in the context of the US-led Global War on Terror. The article's first section establishes the relevance of the study of digital war games to feminist games studies, feminist international relations, and post-colonial feminism. The second section contextualizes the contemporary production and consumption…
Tweeting #RemoveKebab: A Critical Study of the Far Right’s Islamophobic Hate Hashtag on Twitter
Background: To contribute to research on the transnational far right, Islamophobia, and social media platforms, this article interrogates the far right’s practice of using Twitter to produce and circulate a #removekebab hashtag. Analysis: The accounts behind the words and images of 100 #removekebab tweets are analyzed to show how they communicate the transnational far right’s hateful Islamophobic discourse. Conclusion and implications: The far ri…
Ten postulates of a media imperialism framework: For critical research on China’s media power and influence in the Global South
This article considers the growing media power and influence of China in the global South through the lens of a critical media imperialism framework derived from the geopolitical economy of communications research tradition. While extensive research exists on US media imperialism and the challenge to it posed by China’s global media rise, the idea of China as a media imperialist in its own right has received limited attention. This article addres…
The Socialist Project on Social Media Platforms: Anticapitalist Organization in Platform Capitalism
This article is a self-reflexive case study of the Socialist Project's (SP) tactical uses of Meta's Facebook and Google's YouTube platforms. Formed in early 2003 by Leo Panitch (1945-2020), Greg Albo, Sam Gindin, Herman Rosenfeld, and others, the SP is a small Toronto-based democratic socialist organization that for nearly two decades has contributed to wider efforts to build and sustain an anticapitalist "infrastructure of dissent" and "radical …
Redesigning Success: How Post-Growth Economics Can Reshape the Games Industry
The Making of Marxism Today: Cultural-Materialist Insights for Democratic Socialist Media Creators
Google’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Policy and “EDI Solutionism: An Intersectional Feminist Political Economy Analysis
Background: This article applies an intersectional feminist political economy approach to examine the contexts and conditions of Google’s equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) policy. Analysis: Google’s EDI policy framework is interpreted as a strategic response to criticisms of the inequities and oppressions surrounding Google’s work and labour conditions, technological products, and social power. Conclusions and implications: There are notable…
The creator function, post-structuralism, and the perils of terminological dissonance
A broadly interdisciplinary field is emerging to study creators, referred to as “creator studies”, “platforms and cultural production studies”, “influencer studies”, and “ wanghong studies”. Yet the subject of this field—the creator—is still in the process of “being born” or constructed. The definition of the creator that will inevitably stabilize and be governmentalized remains uncertain and contested, shaped by corporations, states, scholars, a…
Political science (13 works) · Sociology (13 works) · Law (12 works) · Media studies (11 works) · Politics (9 works) · History (5 works) · Art (4 works) · Digital Games and Media (4 works) · Engineering (4 works) · Gender, Feminism, and Media (4 works)