One of the most important schools of dramatic theory (at least in London) has no formal articulation. Born on message boards and memes, it offers a loose but broadly consistent collection of views; one that has led to a set of values widely shared within the professional theatre sector. However, because of its informal articulation, it is difficult to engage with as a formal dramaturgy, despite its substantial influence.
This is an attempt to give substance to that cloud. This is an attempt to write about the Tumblr School of Dramaturgy.
What Is It?
For those reading this who don’t know know what Tumblr is, it is a website where people can post images and text. It is particularly known for its culture of different users collectively building up a joke, comment-by-comment, picture-by-picture, leading to easily-screenshotted exchanges of increasing wittiness and stronger takes (whether towards absurdism, horror, extremism or otherwise), or indeed entire imagined fictional universes.
Within the culture of the terminally online, Tumblr is known for being the beating heart of a certain kind of leftism. Drawing on fan cultures, valuing both creative relationships with and discussions of pre-existing media, it is one that is almost religiously engaged with the media outputs of capitalism, while also deeply-rooted in a distinctive fusion of postmodernism, liberation philosophies (especially of queer liberation), and leftist economic theory. It is very keen on critical analysis of media, protecting free speech (including pornographic speech, excluding particular kinds of harmful speech), and Wildean demonstrations of wit (including in affirmation of said values).
I suspect that two practical factors influence this value-system. First, Tumblr users are anonymous. This encourages people to explore and express things that are socially taboo, whether aspects of their sexual and gender identity, political views, or otherwise. Alternative cultures are tolerated and protected, subject to a do-no-harm-to-others perspective.
Second, Tumblr culture is memetic. Ideas surface with no obvious origin. This leads to a thriving meme culture of discussion, wit, and debate. However, it also means that sometimes, quite a complex idea will be introduced to Tumblr’s ongoing conversation, and through the paths of memetic transmission will be simplified, misrepresented, or simply divorced of context and reasoning in such a way that critical engagement with it becomes difficult or impossible, most obviously when someone summarises quite a complex position in a catchy, quotable line.
In brief: were a conservative seeking an example of ‘woke’ culture, Tumblr would be a good place to start. Were a more traditional leftist seeking an example of ‘tenderqueer’ culture, the same would be true.
Why Is It Significant?
Tumblr is a vital site for many artists. It is where they share art, discuss media, and find people and content that inspire them. It is, as mentioned above, a space with a zealous interest in media and discussing it.
Even for those who do not use Tumblr, screenshots of exchanges on Tumblr, memes and jokes refined on Tumblr, and conversations with people whose philosophy of art has been honed on Tumblr will all be part of their life.
I would argue that this is where its significance beyond Tumblr users lies. The Tumblr School spreads its ideas across other sites (Reddit, Facebook, and Instagram all frequently see screenshots of posts from Tumblr go viral) and into practical conversations about the approaches to take to different difficult issues (I would particularly point to its popularisation of the widely-held belief that all art is political, and therefore capable of harm, of which more later).
What Does The Tumblr School Believe?
Officially, nothing. Tumblr has no set ideology. It is an anarchic, collaborative community with its own feuds, divisions, and disagreements.
Unofficially, Tumblr culture has certain core beliefs, like any other culture. Even the most anarchic Tumblr user would accept that an explicit ethnonationalist would be made to feel unwelcome on the platform, and its humour is rooted in a shared culture.
I am absolutely certain that my good-faith attempt to summarise these ideas as a coherent synthesis will be inadequate, and would welcome further thoughts from others. These are, I think, the core pillars of the Tumblr school.
First, Individual Identity Is Defined Politically
Lurking beneath the Tumblr School is a rejection of a broadly liberal universalism in favour of a specific form of individualism.
The Tumblr School generally considers an individual or character’s key identities to be those that exist across axes of oppression. Class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality etc. all are privileged over (for example) specific educational/geographical communities, hobbies and interests, marital status, and ethics/faith, except insofar as those relate to oppression and marginalisation.
It is interesting to note that this is a school formed within a largely anonymous online community that celebrates marginalised identities, which may explain why aspects of identity that might be masked or excluded elsewhere are privileged over other more old-fashioned modes of identity, while those that might be used to identify a person in the world are less emphasised.
Thinking of a colleague of mine, “a middle-class white gay cis male” would likely be the description the Tumblr School considered more significant than the equally-accurate “a married, liberal, opera-going Londoner”. The emphasis is different.
Applying this to characters, “working-class ethnically-ambiguous heterosexual man” and “Violence-loving single Romantic Yorkshireman” both describe Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights in different ways, leading to different interpretations.
Similarly, “white, working class, male, heterosexual police officer” and “Ankh Morpokian, cigar-smoking, married seeker of justice” both describe the character of Sir Samuel Vimes from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series.
This is at the heart of many of the Tumblr School’s claims, including an expansive sense of politics in art. Because…
Second, All Art Is Political
This is, perhaps, where my own interest in the Tumblr School comes in. Tumblr culture has a distinctive politics that is inextricable from its dramaturgy, which I think informs its distinctive features.
Like many others (especially within leftist dramaturgies), the Tumblr School views all media as existing politically. It might affirm conservative values, liberal ones, or liberationist ones. It might celebrate minorities, marginalise them, or erase them.
But it will be political.
2a. Therefore, All Art Can Help Or Harm
Being political, and people being political, art can also cause real-world harm, or help people.
It can help people by celebrating ‘good’ values, highlighting stories and communities neglected by traditional media, offering paths towards a better life (whether as a society, or as a better-adjusted individual), or being made in ways that support that better imagined society.
It can harm people by defending ‘bad’ values, marginalising or stereotyping people who suffer in the real world, celebrating ‘bad’ people, promoting ways of life that limit the freedom of others, or being made in ways that exploit, appropriate, and otherwise harm others.
2b. There Is A Set Of Virtuous Values
I say ‘good’ and ‘bad’ because Tumblr’s ethics are, strangely, a virtue ethics with a utilitarian root.
Broadly, the utilitarian section is: “there are people in this world who are marginalised and suffer for it, largely as a result of social forces. It is desirable to change this in order to reduce harm. Therefore we should encourage those who endeavour to change this.”
However, because these values are often articulated without reference to their pragmatic root, for many Tumblr media critics, they become virtues; things that are right-or-wrong in and of themselves. “It is Good to seek to uplift the marginalised and change society to improve equality. It is therefore Bad to avoid participation in this struggle, or to actively participate in conservative modes of media.”
This is often where critique of the School is pointed: that at some point, a specific, practical, and political claim became an objective virtue. This can make conversation difficult, as the ethics are held within an internally-consistent value system that cannot easily be broken open to discuss.
2c. Art Should Promote Virtuous Values
From the above, it logically follows that “All art is political; it can help or harm. Virtues exist, and art should be virtuous (especially around liberation and promoting virtues).”
Examples of this include celebrating:
Highlighting stories and communities neglected by traditional media: This show tells a story of those the mainstream media tends to neglect, giving a positive (or at least interesting) role model.
Offering paths towards a better life (whether as a society, or as a better-adjusted individual): This show depicts an individual accepting they need therapy, and therefore dealing with their issues before re-engaging with societal problems.
Being made in ways that support that better imagined society: This show was made with equitable treatment of workers, and empowering marginalised voices to take up positions of power and status.
The opposite is, of course, true. It is not that the Tumblr school rejects art that does not conform with its values, but it will raise questions (for example, ‘why does this show have an all-white cast?’ or ‘why does this show have no explicitly LGBTQ characters, despite the statistical improbability of that?’).
Third, All Art Is Equal
The Tumblr School is a voracious consumer of media; somewhere, there is someone talking about almost anything. From Wuthering Heights to Hazbin Hotel, someone on Tumblr is an absolute, brazen nerd about it, and no work deserves any more reverence than any other; all can be turned into a meme, mocked, and otherwise repackaged.
This leads to a remarkably egalitarian attitude to which works are deserving of discussion, debate, enthusiasm, and detailed critique. This seems rooted in two assumptions.
3a. … Because All Art Deserves Analysis
This is the postmodern side of the Tumblr School. It flat-out rejects the idea that (say) Wuthering Heights should be considered superior in any way to Hazbin Hotel. Both can be analysed and discussed in relation to themes, modes of expression, and so on, as long as someone is willing to do so. If we reject conservative ethics, why embrace conservative aesthetics?
Indeed, attempts to create such a hierarchy are perceived as elitist and exclusionary. Which perhaps has more to do with…
3b. … Because All Art Is Content
The flipside of Tumblr’s postmodernism is that, in treating all art the same way, it embraces the view of art-as-content.
This might be because Tumblr, despite its leftism, acknowledges and accepts that with life-under-capitalism, the art it engages with is produced within a capitalist frame. Whether a major streaming series or someone’s homemade webcomic, Tumblr treats it as a capitalist consumer. This art exists to entertain me, and if it does not, then there is no purpose in engaging with it.
This might also be because Tumblr, in a proudly Wildean queer tradition, views decadence (via entertainment, consumption, and wittiness) as a vital value in itself. There is a decadence to Tumblr’s view that in a terrible world (because leftist critiques), seeking distraction and comfort in media is a necessary response.
This is, of course, a decadence that can be easily absorbed within capitalism. But it feels important to articulate the two strands of ‘art is content’ that support the idea that all art is equal.
3c. Therefore Each Individual Can Choose Their Own Art
This argument is somewhat circular. Tumblr culture is rooted in fan-culture, celebrating pieces of media and encouraging people’s individualised readings and interpretations of it (think of, for example, gender-flipped cosplay of Star Trek characters). Fan culture understands that socially-taboo forms of media like comic books can be valuable, and therefore encourages people to value the pieces of media that they enjoy.
It is also a culture that views every person as a potential creator who should (in principle) be valued and encouraged in that act of creation (leaving aside the practicalities of digital culture raising the bar ever-higher for excellence). Each individual is not merely an equal interpreter of media, but also a fellow creator of media in a way that is (within its own framework) very empowering.
Perhaps it is unsurprising, then, that the Tumblr School has concluded that each individual should have the right to choose, without judgement, pieces of media that they enjoy, because all media can be analysed intelligently, and as individuals in a dying world, we seek comfort.
Within the Tumblr School, it would be wrong (or at least strange) to say (for example) that Wuthering Heights is a more ‘worthy’ text than any other. This position is akin to the ethos of Pride’s celebration of everyone, or (more cynically) summarised as “how dare you judge me?”
This leads to the Tumblr School’s positions on the viewer’s relationship to the art.
Fourth, We Engage With Art As Politicised Individuals
Within this model of liberationist capitalist decadence (ye gods, what a clause), in which:
a) the individual exists in a world in which marginalised people are harmed by a lack of representation, and that therefore
b) one of art’s primary goals is to support virtue through representation of marginalised groups, and also that
c) the individual exists as a consumer under capitalism with limited options for free self-expression
media-consumption exists as a way to express identity and one’s own virtue, and as a way to be virtuous in the world. This manifests in various ways.
4a. We Are Individuals Through Art
From the Tumblr School’s liberationist/oppression-focused individualism, it tends to assume that usually, people will want art that they can identify with because they can see themselves reflected in the characters, or at least in some way express and affirm their characteristics through the media. This may include:
taking an interest in characters who share, or are perceived to share, that characteristic, or who are on a journey that can be read as relevant or a metaphor for it
supporting creators who share that characteristic (or rejecting creators who are believed to marginalise people of that group; the Tumblr School does not consistently apply ‘death of the author’)
interpreting media through the lens of that characteristic
The Tumblr School believes that readers identifying with a character is a natural and desirable impact of art.
For example, consider a neurodivergent woman who loves Sherlock Holmes.
The Tumblr School might ask if she can have an explicitly autistic Sherlock Holmes? What about an autistic female Holmes? Or even her own OC (Own Character) based on Sherlock Holmes, but tailored to her and what she finds interesting?
Consumption is a way to express marginalised identities: as someone with specific queer, neurodiverse, cultural experiences etc. It is also a way to consume ‘good’ work, which is both itself virtuous (2c) but will also help instil the individual with a greater sense of proper virtues (2a). That is to say, within capitalism, engagement with virtuous art is a develop oneself as, and to be, a virtuous person.
Many aesthetic theories value identification, in some way, with characters in media. It is at the heart of most claims of why humans like theatre. Yet the Tumblr School is hyper-specific about which characteristics directly can be seen in characters on stage and screen (of which more later).
This seems to combine two roots. First, intersectional analysis values such subdivisions of broader categories. It is worth noting that ‘woman’ can be subdivided into different experiences based on ethnicity, which themselves can be subdivided based on class, and so on and so forth.
More cynically, modern capitalism loves a hyper-specific market. There is not one easily-reproducible symbol for this movement. There is this symbol for your sub-section, and this joke, and this media, and this clothing. Whether horoscopes, sexual orientations, or your favourite character in a show, capitalism constantly encourages us to define ourselves in fragmented ways, and express that through how we consume. The Tumblr School embraces that, even while urging ethical consumption through supporting marginalised creators and similar.
This distinctive capitalist/liberationist approach to how the reader interprets a piece of art is tied to the Tumblr School’s approach to realism, of which more later. It is also leads to one of the more often contested areas of the Tumblr School.
4b. We Engage With Art Individuals Who Deserve Comfort/Safety
The Tumblr School draws heavily on the assumptions of the individualist capitalist consumer, their wants and needs being met. This is similar to the assumptions of ‘therapyspeak’ - therapy-derived language being used to justify questionable behaviour by a defence of the individual’s own needs. It is a phenomenon that the Tumblr community itself has identified and mocked.
However, for the purposes of this blog, the interesting part is that it is widely assumed within the Tumblr School that engagement with art should be safe and comfortable. The School values such measures as content warnings (to ensure that people can avoid content that will trigger memories of traumatic incidents), sensitivity reading (to ensure that misrepresentation of real-world cultures, characteristics and otherwise does not lead to real-world stereotyping and harms) and declaring certain works, creators, and characters ‘problematic’, because of real-world harm they are perceived to do.
That list is, of course, carefully structured from ‘most people would agree that military veterans and victims of sexual assault should not have to unexpectedly engage with their trauma’ to ‘making claims about which work is and is not acceptable, due to its conformity with a given ethical framework, might be something we disagree with’.
In particular, at the extreme end of the Tumblr School is a position that if a word, theme, character or otherwise upsets/distresses/harms any individual reader, to any extent, it should not merely be clearly labelled, but it should not exist. This is usually expressed as “I found this problematic [because it upsets me thusly]”, but can also be expressed in relation to a suspected or imagined issue (such as misrepresenting, appropriating, or insulting a marginalised group).
This is well-intentioned, and coherent within an individualistic ideology of self-affirmation and care, where individuals not only choose which media to enjoy from an aesthetic standpoint, but can also choose it from a perspective of maximising their own comfort. Wanting to not be upset by recreational activities is, of course, normal. In some formulations of the Tumblr School, however, it seems to cross into criticising others for enjoying or making such art.
I do deliberately describe it as the extreme end. Most of the Tumblr School (that I have engaged with) understands it exists in a world where there are an almost infinite number of things that might distress someone, that distress can be a normal and healthy part of life, that there are people with value-systems outside the Tumblr School, and that ultimately there are other things to worry about than pleasing everyone. People can always turn off their devices and touch some grass.
This still speaks to the individualism of the Tumblr School though. Rather than being recipients of someone else’s art, with whatever they wish to include, to some extent it expects to be deeply considered, and given a very particular experience of exemplars, affirmation, safety, and identification.
Which leads nicely to the last pillar.
Fifth, Art Should Have Clear Meaning
This initially seems very similar to ‘All Art Is Political’. I promise it’s not.
I have so far focused on the political aesthetics of the Tumblr School. That is because it is the main thing the Tumblr School examines.
However, it is also because the Tumblr School has a strange absence of other aesthetics.
5a. It Is Better For Critics To Be Witty Than Wise
Tumblr is a platform of constant conversations, reimagines, and playful yes-anding to different comments.
However, I have chosen to mention Wilde at several points throughout this blog because there is a Wildean tendency to how Tumblr discussion often takes place. Big, bold, witty comments seem to get noticeably more engagement than moderate, critical discussions (a phenomena common to many social media platforms).
It is wittiness, not wisdom, that thrives. The Tumblr School was not honed in an environment of “I think I see what you’re saying, but I might disagree with reference to a close reading of these arguments.” Despite the apparent conversation, it is not usually comparable to the critical discussions one might find within a Marxian school of aesthetics, for example.
This may be related to the aforementioned nature of Tumblr as a place for mutual affirmation; a tendency ill-served by a detailed, thoughtful critique. It may also be related to the shortform, memetic nature of Tumblr posts removing the substance required for such critique, or the ideological/ethical homogenity of the Tumblr ecosystem. There is discussion, but within the assumptions of the Tumblr School.
5b. We Analyse To Seek Definite Meaning
It is noticeable that the Tumblr School often uses analysis to identify characters along axes of marginalisation and personal growth, explain foreshadowing and metaphors, and explain how an author achieves their intent.
These fit into two categories: practical, nuts-and-bolts analysis of ‘the author wanted to achieve X by doing Y’, and realist ‘beyond its literal plot, this is how this work relates to the real world’ (it is worth noting in passing that these are taught in Anglophone compulsory education, perhaps reflecting Tumblr’s young user-base rather than the ideal tools for the sorts of work the Tumblr School is trying to do).
For analysing characters, plots, and other elements of media with reference to the real world is something the Tumblr School does with enthusiasm. Whether the real-world parallels are explicit or intentional (the School’s preference for modern work) or matters of individual postmodernist interpretation (common when reading classic work), the Tumblr School seeks to tie the meaning of most work to society and its politics of marginalisation, or explain perceived plotholes, worldbuilding, and other aspects of the fictional reality.
This love of giving value to art by extracting a specific socio-political meaning from it is a distinctive feature of the Tumblr School. Although it views all art as open to interpretation, that interpretation is fixed within a view of art as political. Which leads to perhaps the strangest part of the Tumblr School (to me).
5c. Beauty And The Sublime Are Not Discussed
While preparing this blog, I focused on what was present in the Tumblr School. It was only while writing it I realised a glaring absence from it.
The Tumblr School almost never talks about beauty beyond the emotional impact of a work on an individual. There is little to no sense of the sublime or unspeakable, perhaps because of the School’s aversion to universalism.
Instead, works are described as beautiful where they move someone emotionally, often explained by its relevance to their life. But the artwork itself is not beautiful in any abstract sense.
Similarly, the Tumblr School struggles with aspects of (say) Wuthering Heights that are nothing to do with socio-political realities. If we view its high concept as tension between the wild and civilisation, this is far less interesting than questions of abuse, race, and class.
This is where the Tumblr School’s socio-political literalism really becomes obvious. Art is analysed primarily to understand its meaning and the ways it might be problematic or emotionally impactful, not as a beautiful thing in itself.
Where Does This Leave Us? Seven Questions
Towards the end of a very long blog, so to summarise:
First, Individual Identity Is Defined Politically
Second, All Art Is Political
2a. Therefore, All Art Can Help Or Harm
2b. There Is A Set Of Virtuous Values
2c. Art Should Promote Virtuous Values
Third, All Art Is Equal
3a. … Because All Art Deserves Analysis
3b. … Because All Art Is Content
3c. Therefore Each Individual Can Choose Their Own Art
Fourth, We Engage With Art As Politicised Individuals
4a. We Engage With Art As Political Individuals
4b. We Engage With Art Individuals Who Deserve Comfort/Safety
Fifth, Art Should Be Clear
5a. It Is Better For Critics To Be Witty Than Wise
5b. We Analyse To Seek Definite Meaning
5c. Beauty And The Sublime Are Not Discussed
Where Does This Leave Us?
The Tumblr School is a fascinating dramaturgical/aesthetic school combining elements of most major strands of aesthetics and leftist philosophy into a striking synthesis. By spelling it out in this way, I feel that I’ve been able to articulate a reasonably fair account of its core beliefs, logical foundations, and aesthetic positions.
However, I have done so in order to understand a set of assumptions I often encounter, both to celebrate it and to identify where there are questions to discuss. I do not pretend to be wholly original, but to ask seven questions:
1. Is This Synthesis Coherent?
Most individual components of the Tumblr School’s core foundations - liberationism, postmodernism, utilitarianism, decadence - are laudable.
However, it is worth asking whether collectively they are coherent. As mentioned above, the Tumblr School leaps from a utilitarian liberation ethics to a virtue ethics of absolute values without (as far as I can tell) noticing or justifying that step beyond ‘the logic leading up to this is correct, and therefore it is a virtue’.
There is an amusement in a decadent/postmodern virtue ethics; one that I suspect some on Tumblr would be the first to laugh at. On one hand, the School wants to claim that there is no hierarchy on aesthetics, while also wanting to claim that there is a definite hierarchy in ethics (which supersedes aesthetics).
Perhaps this doesn’t matter if wittily and divertingly expressed. But it creates tensions.
2. Who Is In The In-Group?
As aforementioned, the Tumblr School is very interested in marginalised peoples. It is willing to accept a very broad spectrum of individuals who face exclusion in many other places.
I suspect that most of Tumblr would essentially define their defining rule as ‘you are tolerated, as long as you tolerate/do not harm others’. However, the Tumblr School’s particular sense of where speech-acts become harm means that many fall into the out-group, or fail to meet its ethical standards and therefore are not solidly part of the in-group.
Whose marginalisation matters? Most would agree, for example, that struggling workers in post-industrial towns are marginalised socially, culturally and politically. If those workers are not LGBTQ positive, do they deserve the full sympathy of the Tumblr School? If not, what is the central pillar of its politics of liberation beyond marginalisation? Ethical worth?
3. The Spectre Of Capitalism
There is a close relationship between the assumptions of the Tumblr School and capitalism. Tumblr is a joyous platform of individual creators, many of whom commodify their work and find a community willing to support that, while also acknowledging and resenting the capitalist world around them.
Capitalism produces the mass media the School celebrates, commodifies and co-generates the identities it seeks to celebrate, and is a vital part of the fan culture that Tumblr is rooted in. However, some of these more insidious ways of thinking, such as the use of marginalised identities as a personal brand rather than an aspect of a person, are important to note.
At a deeper level, we return to the question of the School’s questionable synthesis. Is it possible to form a dramaturgy of liberation that so embraces capitalism (leaving aside a knowing, ironic sigh)? How about a truly ethical framework?
4. Where Is Beauty?
The Tumblr School loves beautiful things. It loves creating them, analysing them, and celebrating them.
Yet it offers, at best, a brutally mundane justification for beauty rooted in self-identification and personal affirmation/comfort. I put this at the mid-point of the questions because I think it’s the hardest one for the Tumblr School.
It loves art, but why? Perhaps because it assumes that everyone knows what beauty is, it focuses instead on the use of beauty as a tool for social change. But can the Tumblr School embrace a Rothko? Cubism? Instrumental music - even as the overture for an opera?
5. What Of Meatspace?
The Tumblr School comes from a community that offers real value and meaning for its members, and those outside it.
Yet it is rooted in philosophies of liberation, utilitarian ethics, and leftist aesthetics that would quite likely turn around to the Tumblr School and question whether it had thought enough about real-world effects.
Can a perfectly unproblematic work of media truly change the world if it must be released through an inherently commercial platform, divorced from the tedious day-to-day work of activism, social support, and community in the real world? If not, does the Tumblr School consider that important?
6. Why Does It Smell So Conservative?
This is not an entirely original observation, but to articulate it in reference to this blog:
Perhaps because of the absence of an explicitly-articulated and coherent philosophical root, the Tumblr School seems to have become one of its own bugbears. By not taking an explicit and thought-out stance against the dominant modes of thought, it has accidentally adopted some of them.
That is to say: the Tumblr School attempts to build an aesthetic system from fragments of other philosophical systems. In order to stitch them together, it seems to have (unthinkingly) reached for some of the most dominant systems of conservative thought.
Individual identity is defined in relation to one’s place in an ethical frame; all art can be assessed by how far it advances that ethics, and this overrides any consideration of beauty, quality, or otherwise. When we engage with art, we engage as people within this framework, and when we analyse it, we analyse within that ethics; those who do not share the ethics are impure.
This combination of a belief in fixed values, and a demand for art to express them, is equally true of the Tumblr School and many evangelical Christian aesthetics.
How does the Tumblr School address free speech outside its ethical frame, if it defines much of such speech as harmful (sinful)? Or is this unfair?
7. Last, What Is Its Interesting Question Beyond ‘Is This Ethical’?
This I leave as an exercise for the reader. It is, perhaps, the great gap in my understanding between viewing the School as a useful tool for the socially-engaged maker, and a sufficient tool in-and-of itself.
But for now, I leave you. Thank you for reading this. I look forward to finding out how and where I am wrong, and urge you to read Tumblr yourself.
Despite the above, it’s really very interesting.
Commentaires