Little Monster Village

Ever since Lady Gaga stepped into the entertainment scene she has been a world wind of controversy. Her expletive lyrics, brazen fashion and feverous support for the issues most have been afraid to support have served as the impetus of her cult like following.  Her strong following has allowed Gaga to construct her own social networking site LittleMonsters.com. The site itself was built by Backplane an organization which claims, “Fills a gap in the current social spectrum by empowering sharing and conversation that is effortless but not automatic”.  Gaga’s imagined community aligns itself with Benedict Anderson notion of imagined community, “as overcoming distance of Space newspaper and effects of the division of time”. Gaga’s reach has extended across oceans, disseminated it’s self through every medium of media and over the years remains relevant factor within the entertainment industry. Gaga and her “Little Monsters” is testament as to how an imagined community can be a powerful player in shaping national conversations and defining national identity.

In his article on “Viewing the ‘National’ in ‘International Communication’: Through the Lens of Diaspora” , Karim H. Karim speaks of imagined communities and their abilities to create “a common socio-political consciousness”, even though those individuals had not ever met (394).  Gaga and her Little Monsters has been an paradigm of the power imagined communities can have towards focusing conversations and raising consciousness. Lady Gaga is a powerful actor in the cause towards tolerance and marriage equality, in the United States. The spark of consciousness among the American people and across the world in part has proliferated because of Gaga and her “Little Monsters”. Her community’s stance over marriage equality has sprung the issue to the forefront of current national conversations; a conversation that attempts to redefine the identity of what it means exactly to be an American and a free individual. 

Lady Gagas work building a safe community where disparate groups can come together and embrace their difference she has single handedly challenged the perception of what is normal.

 Lady Gaga’s  success through  is her acceptance of  “weird” , shows the power of imagined communities and their abilities to redefine the identities and serve as a major player in the national conversations that take place.