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Abstract
This dissertation discusses three popular YouTube video bloggers (vloggers), Mr. Chi-City, Shaycarl, and iJustine, and their relationship to the site as a vehicle for cultural production. It employs a framework for studying cultural production on YouTube that focuses on its key components: authorship, performance, and narrative. It discusses the significance of the interaction between the YouTube space (conceptualized as a platform) and its users, both of which are imbued with their own agency to negotiate the dynamics of the space. The dissertation contends that vloggers, using the tools made available by the platform as a site of cultural possibility, produce work that is sophisticated and variable, all while being constantly engaged with feedback solicited from and offered by other users. It uses the language of participatory culture and produsage to draw out this relationship and suggests ways in which the elements of cultural practice on the platform play themselves out on the increasingly influential space.