Paper Questions

Here are some questions I have that could potentially become a paper:



I’m interested in thinking about the small magazines and literary publications we were talking about in the first few weeks of class. It’s crazy to me that projects like The Baffler and One Story--which subsist on relatively small, underground readerships--can exist in the same ecosystem as The New Yorker or Vanity Fair--huge publications geared towards a popular (if not a bit highbrow) audience, with enormous readerships and lots of money. I want to know how these small publications carve their niches and how they relate to a new kind of instagram-flavored “zine” culture I see emerging among artistic sets of Gen Z-ers and Millennials (the local mag “Sleepless” comes to mind). http://www.sleeplessboston.com/home



Also, what would become of the big publications if there were no underground literary journals? I’d like to look into the relationship between mainstream/underground cultural movements in general, and how this dynamic manifests in publishing. 



Another question I’d like to explore is a little more nonspecific. How have changes in the publishing industry in the 21st century also changed how we read? I’m interested in pursuing questions related to ebooks and online publishing, but also things like the Publication Studio Standler was writing about, which I could see as being a kind of reaction against the huge boom of digital content in the 21st century and content in general as part of the “publishing machine.” How do readers interact with all this content, digital or otherwise?