MOONWALKING: TRACING REDDITORS’ DIGITAL MEMORY WORK ON MICHAEL JACKSON

In this paper, we theoretically appropriate moonwalking to describe the memory work of Michael Jackson enthusiasts on the subreddit /r/MichaelJackson. Here, fans have been sharing thoughts, feelings, video clips, stories and photographs about the so-called King of Pop since the page’s creation after his death in 2009. They have been engaging in discussions about Michael Jackson’s private and public life and debating how this controversial celebrity should be remembered posthumously. The mnemonic practices of Redditors (Reddit users), we argue, share characteristics of Jackson’s dance technique. On the one hand, people engaged in the public construction of Michael Jackson’s memory go back in time. They use their own memories or archived content to emphasize particular elements of his public or private persona. On the other hand, they continually alter how he is remembered and forgotten, depending on the context of the present, which informs and shapes this process.