Today marks the end of March, and 2026 continues its onward trudge. March also is the end of my first quarter, and - as you’re reading this - I’m currently on my reset weeks. I’ve talked about this a bit on my vlogs, but I always take two weeks between quarters to catch up on life and house admin, consult where I’m at in terms of my writing projects, and plan a nice approach for the next quarter. And, you know, if I play some Pokopia in the meantime, then I guess that’s just what it is.

Anyway, March is always a weird month in the layout of it in terms of content production. So instead of an extra substack post, you’re getting this! But all other content should be on track. So, let’s recap what happened this month!

Substack Posts

• ​Mythology of Taylor Swift Research Update - In case you didn’t know, I’m doing a big research project into the mythology of Taylor Swift. In this post, I just recap a little bit about what I’ve been doing, and some of the topics I’m finding interesting.
• ​Anthropology Lessons: Love Island All Stars - I’ve always said reality television is like watching really deep unethical anthropological research. So I’m showing you what I mean by looking at the latest season of Love Island All Stars, and some of the social and cultural things we can see happening in that show. Stay tuned for more of that!
• ​On Cringe - I’ve been so interested in cringe. Cringe is a fascinating phenomonon which is both very new and also so very old. But what exactly is it? And when something is cringey, what does that tell us about it? Or, maybe more importantly, what does that tell us about the person cringing?
• ​Anthropology Lessons: Love is Blind and Maternity - Well, I guess you didn’t want to wait long for the next anthropology reality television lesson. I wanted to revisit what I called The Myth of Maternity and see how it’s working on the context of Emma from the latest season of Love is Blind.

Video Essay

I have previously told you about my favourite quote from Mary Douglas: “Dirt is Matter Out of Place”. I talked about it on Fan of That, I’ve talked about it on Susbtack, and now I get to talk about it on a video essay. And what better case study for conversations around purity and danger than Spirited Away. So if you want a mini-structuralist analysis tied with a recap of one of the most important works in anthropology, then go ahead and check that out.

Reference Pages

Thought I should actually start including this in the round up. Every month, about two weeks after the video essay comes out, I do a short reflection on the previous video essay, some of the topics I either wanted to include and didn’t, or maybe a look at some of the references. And then, almost always, I also include a short annotated bibliography on related works. If you’re interested, you can pay for a substack subscription and then it unlocks for you. I don’t hold very much locked, because I fundamentally believe education should not be behind paywalls. So, at least for the time being, this is the only thing I hold back.

Anyway, this month’s was a reflection on my video essay on New Girl. This one didn’t have an annotated bibliography because it was more of an episode deep dive, but I did talk about some other episodes that were similar in breaking traditional structure.

Writing Vlogs

• ​A Productive Research Day | Taylor Swift and Mythology Study - I really struggled to focus on my Taylor Swift and mythology study in the last vlog, but this one I really rallied and actually managed to do some stuff. I also show a bit about how I do interview transcripts if you’re interested.
• ​A Day Reading for Research | Research Vlog for Nonfiction Writing - if you want to see the background I did on the cringe substack post, as well as some other works I got coming down the line, this is the vlog for you! I had a lot of readings I had to do for Incidental Mythology work, so I spent a whole day researching through reading some academic pieces.
• ​A Nonfiction Writing Day | substacks and video essays | 3000 words - I had to catch up on actually writing/producing some work. I accidentally ended up having a day where I needed to write two substack posts and a video essay. Ooops. But I managed to write just over 3000 words!
• ​A Full Research Day | Taylor Swift and Mythology Project - Another Taylor Swift day! More transcription, some research grabbing, and circulating more call out for interviews and surveys.

I’m a Fan of That

I’m a Fan of That is starting to wind down the off season bonus episodes. If you’re wanting to continue to listen to us during the main feed break, you can go check out our Patreon. The two episodes we got up for March was a very long-winded and rambling look at the “Romantasy” genre. We also have an episode all about things that are cosy - what makes a cosy genre cosy?

Only two more episodes until we break for a week or two and then come back on the main feed with season 4!

And that’s it for March! I’ll be back with a reference page for the video essay on Spirited Away soon, and then a fun little exploration of what I’m writing and reading and enjoying about halfway through April. Obviously, if you want to be able to see all these things as they come out, rather than in the recap alone, you can go ahead and subscribe on many platforms for free! As I said, I don’t like putting things behind paywalls, so substack, youtube and Fan of That are all free for most.

Until then, as always, be kind to one another! Talk to you soon!