[Commlist] Targeted CFP: Pikachu’s Transmedia Adventures: The Continuing Adaptability of the Pokémon Franchise

*Targeted CFP: Pikachu’s Transmedia Adventures: The Continuing 
Adaptability of the Pokémon Franchise*

In 2025 the Pokémon franchise will celebrate the 30th anniversary of its 
debut in Japan and the fifth anniversary of its popular worldwide AR 
cell phone game Pokémon Go. In fact, Pokémon is arguably experiencing 
something of a resurgence and renaissance within the current cultural 
moment. When a pop-up Pokémon Centre store was opened in London in 2018 
to mark the release of Sword and Shield, queues for entering the retail 
space frequently had to be closed due to demand whilst product lines 
regularly sold out daily. In 2019, when the long-running cartoon’s main 
character Ash Ketchum finally won a Pokémon tournament, major news sites 
humorously deemed this victory a newsworthy event (Bissett 2019). More 
recently, a revival in Pokémon card collecting has left retail shelves 
bare and scalpers running rampant whilst mint-condition ‘graded’ cards 
have sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars at auction (Koebler 
2021). Meanwhile, the games themselves continue to be adapted to 
Nintendo’s console platforms, with the Nintendo Switch releasing both 
remakes of previously popular titles (Pokémon Let’s Go! Pikachu and 
Let’s Go! Eevee, Pokémon Snap) as well as new titles exploring hitherto 
unknown regions (Pokémon Sword and Shield). Much more than a franchise 
intended to commercially target and exploit children, the Pokémon 
franchise represents an enduringly popular intellectual property that 
continues to attract interest across generations.
Despite this, in-depth and continuous academic study of this hugely 
popular intellectual property has been infrequent at best. In fact, the 
last time that a dedicated collection of essays exploring the franchise 
in a holistic manner was published was in 2004, with many of the 
contributors positioning the property as a ‘fad’ whose cycle of 
popularity was apparently at its end (see Tobin 2004; N.B. the augmented 
reality game Pokémon Go (Niantic 2016- ) has bucked this trend by 
generating considerable academic attention – see Kulak, Purzycki, 
Henthorn and Vie 2019; Saker and Evans 2021). Where Pokémon has 
attracted infrequent academic discussion, this has occurred in the 
context of assessing how wider cultural flows from Japan to the West 
have impacted on children’s media (Allison 2006; O’Melia 2020). What is 
absent, then, is a volume that takes the Pokémon franchise on its own 
terms, and which situates the property within a much-changed media 
environment. Thus, a study is needed which considers Pokémon in terms of 
multiple contemporary debates within media and cultural studies. These 
include – but are no way limited to – cultural, technological, and media 
convergence (Jenkins 2006), discourses of transmediality and media mix 
(Steinberg 2012; Williams 2020), paratextuality (Gray 2010), licensing 
and/or (transgenerational) media industries studies (Santo 2015; Johnson 
2019), material culture (Geraghty 2014; Bainbridge 2017) and fan 
cultures (Scott 2019; Stanfill 2019). Whether approached as a transmedia 
franchise, corporate intellectual property, system offering ludic 
possibilities, fan community, or otherwise, academic scholarship should 
better consider how the Pokémon franchise has engaged with, adapted to, 
and challenged the contours of the ever-evolving transmedia environment.
We have already received several chapters for the collection but seek 
now to fill gaps on the following topics.
This call for papers seeks abstracts for chapters of approx. 6000 words 
that explore the following topics:

  * The Industrial development of The Pokémon Company and its corporate
    relations with Nintendo and other licensed partners.
  * Pokémon and the historical development of media industries studies.
  * Pokémon and its links to music, sound, soundtracks, etc.

  * Pokémon’s status as a Japanese media franchise or example of ‘media 
mix’

We are especially interested in soliciting chapters featuring 
non-Western perspectives as well as ones engaging with historically 
marginalised or underrepresented groups.
We hope to include work from both established and emerging scholars; 
junior scholars & graduate students are encouraged to apply.
Please email abstracts of 300 words with an accompanying Author Bio of 
approx. 200 words to Ross Garner ((GarnerRP1 /at/ Cardiff.ac.uk) 
<mailto:(GarnerRP1 /at/ Cardiff.ac.uk)>) Rebecca Williams 
((rebecca.williams /at/ southwales.ac.uk) 
<mailto:(rebecca.williams /at/ southwales.ac.uk)>) and EJ Nielsen (ej 
<mailto:(enielsen /at/ umass.edu)>(nielsen.ephemera /at/ gmail.com) 
<mailto:(nielsen.ephemera /at/ gmail.com)>) by *Tuesday 10th June 2025*. If 
accepted first drafts of completed chapters will be due Friday 3rd 
October 2025.



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