ABSTRACT
The cover of this book explains its subject. Pam Grier is determinedly pointing a gun at the reader. Is it in desperation; or with dedication? Determination, desperation and dedication are words often used to describe the public presence of cult cinema. They also command this book. Ours is an attempt to further the examination of an area in the study of culture at large that has persistently been side-lined yet whose traces are more than ever before prevalent across cultures – and evidenced by their consumptions, celebrations, and the anxieties that surround them. True to the word’s heritage in the study of spiritual followings of dedication, and equally true to the word’s adoption in studies of feasts, carnival, festivities, and cultural expressions of ‘shaking it up’, cult cinema is an experiential test tube for culture, where diverse formations and collections of people experiment with what can work, what doesn’t, and what shouldn’t to give meaning to the world through off-centre multitudes of cultural practices and considerations. Scholars such as Roland Barthes (1957), Mary Douglas (1966), René Girard (1972), Dick Hebdige (1979), Umberto Eco (1991) and Barbara Ehrenreich (2006) have, in their examinations of rituals, taboos, and trangressive expressions in photography, writing, fashion, religion, rock music, and cultural celebrations and commemorations put cultural ‘maladjustment’ front and centre. This book does, too.
