Personal Fandom Psychological Study - Episode 1
I want to start examining why I read fic, what its purpose is in my life, why I read what I read (and don't read what I don't read) and write what I write. I want to think about what it is that draws me to fandoms and pairings, what they have in common and what they have unique to themselves. I want to come to a better understanding about myself by examining my biggest hobby, fic.
Basically, I want to conduct a psychological experiment on myself. Woot! This should take several days and several entries, which is a good thing, I think. One step at a time, yeah?
I think it's best to start at the begining. So here we go, my list of fandoms:
I had to think about this for a bit, and what I'm considering "in currently" are fandoms that I read on a regular basis and that have new fics being written and/or I'm actively seeking out fic. There are some fandoms that I read but I basically read the same stories over and over, and those will be listed later.
So current fandoms include:
Popslash
Psych
As the World Turns
Nascar RPF
Chuck
How I Met Your Mother
Harry Potter
Glee
Criminal Minds
Out of these, at the moment, I'm most interested in Glee, Criminal Minds and As the World Turns. Nascar and HIMYM are slower fandoms, and Chuck has been on hiatus for what seems like 8.5 years. Harry Potter, Psych and Popslash are on/off fandoms for me, ones that I read probaby every couple of weeks as opposed to my main three, which I tend to read daily. Criminal Minds is a special case, because I'm starting the show now, even though it's in its fifth season. Because of that, there's a proliferation of back fic to catch up on. Even still, based on what comes through my LJ friends page, I think there will be plenty of fic even after I'm caught up.
Some fandoms are slow, like Nascar and HIMYM, but some fandoms are just glacial. It could be becuase of personal preference, story type, pairing or location, but for one reason or another, I don't find enough fic to satisfy me.
For me, these fandoms would be:
One Life to Live
The Big Bang Theory
Castle
This is a funny category. I don't watch these shows any longer, and I don't search out new fic. I do, however, re-read old stories, some over and over again. I might go days, weeks, months or years between re-readings, depending on my mood. When the mood strikes to re-read one of these fandoms, though, I tend to re-read all of my favorite stories, often over the course of a few days. New things may be being written in these fandoms, but I'm not looking.
For me, these fandoms are, in order of re-reading frequency:
Star Trek: Voyager
Grey's Anatomy
Torchwood
West Wing
Lord of the Rings
I have Star Trek: Voyager on DVD, but I rarely watch it. I have probably 15-20 fics that I re-read in this fandom. Grey's Anatomy and Torchwood have both gone from shows that I loved to shows that I no longer watch, pretty much because of creative choices I didn't care for. The fic I read in these two fandoms all comes from before those decisions--George is alive, Owen, Tosh and Ianto are alive. I pretty much hate character death, and it's one of the last straws for me. I get that it has to be done, but I just prefer to not be invovled. There are two long stories in the West Wing fandom that I re-read every six to eight months or so (and they're het, which is just strange! West Wing is the one fandom I don't read slash in, but that's an issue for another time.). I rarely read Lord of the Rings fic, but about once a year I re-read Bill the Pony's stories.
There are a few fandoms that I used to participate in but, for some reason or another, no longer even re-read the fic. I don't search out the fic and/or keep up with the show.
These fandoms are:
X-Men (movieverse)
X-Files
Heroes
RPS American Idol
LOTRIPS
Heroes just became disappointing all around for me. I dropped out after season one, and that included dropping out of fic. I was younger when X-Files was on television, high school age, and it's just one of those things that got lost in the switch from high school to college. I'm not sure why I became disinterested in the X-Men arena, and I was only interested in two seasons of American Idol (not concurrent--seasons two and six). I don't know why I stopped partiipating in LOTRIPS--I lasted a couple of years after the franchise ended.
For some reason, certain shows just don't interest me when it coems to fandom. I watch or watched the episodes, maybe read the boards on Television Without Pity, but I am not actively more involved. My guess is that these shows have some common thread that causes me to not be more invovled. It's something I want to study more in the future.
One note - I'm only including shows that I was interested in from the time I was a late teenager on. The reasons for this are twofold--one, I didn't have an understanding of fandom until later in my teenage years, and two, the internet wasn't such a huge place when I was younger. I'm sure there was fic out there, but finding it was beyond my capability.
Shows in this category include:
Friends
Will and Grace
Queer as Folk
Dawson's Creek
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
House
Jericho
Fringe
Private Practice
So there you have it. The exhaustive list of my fandoms, ones I participate in, participated in, never participated in. Tomorrow I'll consider my pairings within these fandoms. Once the foundation has been set, it'll be time to really examine all of this in greater detail.
Basically, I want to conduct a psychological experiment on myself. Woot! This should take several days and several entries, which is a good thing, I think. One step at a time, yeah?
I think it's best to start at the begining. So here we go, my list of fandoms:
I had to think about this for a bit, and what I'm considering "in currently" are fandoms that I read on a regular basis and that have new fics being written and/or I'm actively seeking out fic. There are some fandoms that I read but I basically read the same stories over and over, and those will be listed later.
So current fandoms include:
Popslash
Psych
As the World Turns
Nascar RPF
Chuck
How I Met Your Mother
Harry Potter
Glee
Criminal Minds
Out of these, at the moment, I'm most interested in Glee, Criminal Minds and As the World Turns. Nascar and HIMYM are slower fandoms, and Chuck has been on hiatus for what seems like 8.5 years. Harry Potter, Psych and Popslash are on/off fandoms for me, ones that I read probaby every couple of weeks as opposed to my main three, which I tend to read daily. Criminal Minds is a special case, because I'm starting the show now, even though it's in its fifth season. Because of that, there's a proliferation of back fic to catch up on. Even still, based on what comes through my LJ friends page, I think there will be plenty of fic even after I'm caught up.
Some fandoms are slow, like Nascar and HIMYM, but some fandoms are just glacial. It could be becuase of personal preference, story type, pairing or location, but for one reason or another, I don't find enough fic to satisfy me.
For me, these fandoms would be:
One Life to Live
The Big Bang Theory
Castle
This is a funny category. I don't watch these shows any longer, and I don't search out new fic. I do, however, re-read old stories, some over and over again. I might go days, weeks, months or years between re-readings, depending on my mood. When the mood strikes to re-read one of these fandoms, though, I tend to re-read all of my favorite stories, often over the course of a few days. New things may be being written in these fandoms, but I'm not looking.
For me, these fandoms are, in order of re-reading frequency:
Star Trek: Voyager
Grey's Anatomy
Torchwood
West Wing
Lord of the Rings
I have Star Trek: Voyager on DVD, but I rarely watch it. I have probably 15-20 fics that I re-read in this fandom. Grey's Anatomy and Torchwood have both gone from shows that I loved to shows that I no longer watch, pretty much because of creative choices I didn't care for. The fic I read in these two fandoms all comes from before those decisions--George is alive, Owen, Tosh and Ianto are alive. I pretty much hate character death, and it's one of the last straws for me. I get that it has to be done, but I just prefer to not be invovled. There are two long stories in the West Wing fandom that I re-read every six to eight months or so (and they're het, which is just strange! West Wing is the one fandom I don't read slash in, but that's an issue for another time.). I rarely read Lord of the Rings fic, but about once a year I re-read Bill the Pony's stories.
There are a few fandoms that I used to participate in but, for some reason or another, no longer even re-read the fic. I don't search out the fic and/or keep up with the show.
These fandoms are:
X-Men (movieverse)
X-Files
Heroes
RPS American Idol
LOTRIPS
Heroes just became disappointing all around for me. I dropped out after season one, and that included dropping out of fic. I was younger when X-Files was on television, high school age, and it's just one of those things that got lost in the switch from high school to college. I'm not sure why I became disinterested in the X-Men arena, and I was only interested in two seasons of American Idol (not concurrent--seasons two and six). I don't know why I stopped partiipating in LOTRIPS--I lasted a couple of years after the franchise ended.
For some reason, certain shows just don't interest me when it coems to fandom. I watch or watched the episodes, maybe read the boards on Television Without Pity, but I am not actively more involved. My guess is that these shows have some common thread that causes me to not be more invovled. It's something I want to study more in the future.
One note - I'm only including shows that I was interested in from the time I was a late teenager on. The reasons for this are twofold--one, I didn't have an understanding of fandom until later in my teenage years, and two, the internet wasn't such a huge place when I was younger. I'm sure there was fic out there, but finding it was beyond my capability.
Shows in this category include:
Friends
Will and Grace
Queer as Folk
Dawson's Creek
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
House
Jericho
Fringe
Private Practice
So there you have it. The exhaustive list of my fandoms, ones I participate in, participated in, never participated in. Tomorrow I'll consider my pairings within these fandoms. Once the foundation has been set, it'll be time to really examine all of this in greater detail.