Humanities Honors Program

This thesis examines how the reception practice or aesthetic sensibility known as camp is exercised in the 21st century. It explores the contemporary avenues in which the sensibility appears and evolves, namely, social media platforms. Through sites such as X and Instagram, it investigates the range of content that emerged from the Wicked franchise and its seemingly never-ending press tour. From users making press tour parodies to adding Wicked images to arbitrary posts, this thesis identifies where the essence of camp develops. It begins with one of the most recognized and remixed moments from the press tour, the Out Magazine interview by Tracy E. Gilchrist with Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, and examines its varied responses to assess where a sense of esoterism differentiates parody makers from camp creators. Users’ inability to perceive or play into the humor highlights how camp receptors communicate through the content’s visual and linguistic language. Furthermore, this thesis highlights the queerness found in the Wicked franchise, underlining the gay sensibility that inspires the qualities that are most integral to camp, preparing the text to be circulated in an online camp culture. In addition, it emphasizes how an online camp culture differs from a traditional one, as social media profiles more visibly exhibit the roles of women, as well as anonymous users, as arbiters and receptors, which expands the expectation of a camp audience. Finally, this thesis discovers how the incongruities and referentiality that transform Wicked content are applied to other texts as users revisit camp canon with a unique sense of humor, defining the practice of online camp.