female space and fannish femininity

[heyiya]

There's a very interesting conversation between Robin Anne Reid and Sean Griffin up at Henry Jenkins's blog here and here and mirrored on LJ at fandebate here, part of a summer project discussing gender hierarchies in fan studies. I commented in response to some discussions about essentialism, and ended up coming up with a mini-theory about fandom and

Comments

[heyiya]

I guess what I'm suggesting is that there's a certain stereotype in the world regardless of whether we reinforce it: of an 'immature,' girly emotionalism that is frequently understood as feminine (the teenage girl into popstars, fainting for joy and wetting her knickers). It's a stereotype that as a teenager I was highly insistent on distancing myself from, but that the community and language of fandom gave me a space to reclaim. I never wanted to be that girl - but now I think that maybe after all there are useful ways in which that figure can be valued rather than dismissed. It's as much about valuing what's perceived to be immature as what's perceived to be feminine (I do feel that the two are linked, but you may disagree). Perhaps the image of immaturity, and disclaiming the idea of excessive excitement as immature, is a place we could meet

[heyiya]

Yay, agreement! :)

I can still refuse to be complicit

I can totally see your reasoning there. I think I'm influenced by queer and genderqueer writings and practices so that I see non-complicity as being something that can be practiced by performing gendered practices in ways that mess with the conventional construction of gender while acknowledging it (drag being the obvious eg) as well as by the kind of refusal you're carrying out; but it sounds like we want more or less the same thing in the end. Ie, not restricting how people can express themselves by the gender they (appear to) 'be'.

(sidebar: "is he gay or just British?"; In Britain, I have heard "Gay, or European?"meaning mainland Europe, of course.)

[penguin_attie]

Must be the other Europeans. Because us Germans certainly aren't like that. We just say "hello" and maybe wave at each other. Shake hands if we're being formal. (I'm living in France. People kiss me all the time! It freaks me out! Stop invading my space, people!)

It always amuses me how totally different people just get lumped together by outsiders. "fangirls" is another of these words that regroup a totally diverse, contradictory set of people...

[heyiya]

I've heard the gay/European thing mostly as a joke, with regard to European men's clothes - tight trousers and such. But it does definitely make a good case for the different understandings of sexual identity and gender across cultures. Like my friend who's English and lives in South Korea, where guys hold hands without a second thought but her Korean friend was shocked to find out that Elton John is gay!

I hope you don't mean that I'm lumping together fangirls as a singular category. Of course it's a diverse group - but I am very interested in the shared practices and shared experiences that allow us to experience it *as* a group at all. If you can stand long theoretical comments, there are some very interesting debates going on about this very subject at the post I linked to over at fandebate.

[penguin_attie]

Oh, no of course I didn't mean you in particular were doing any lumping here! I just meant to say that the gay/british/european joke goes on once you cross into mainland Europe as well... there's always a smaller group that is even gayer/weirder/whatever. And it's like the geek hierarchy in a way. I was just amused at the recurring patterns. It's like that henna artist forum I got into via my mother... no relation to fandom whatsoever, but boy, do they have their flamewars, competing BNFs, wankfests, fanon (if you see scientific fact as canon here), trolling, minions, etc...

[heyiya]

Glad I didn't come across lumpy, just checking!

Oh, the geek hierarchy - *totally*!! And I hear you on the universality of the wankfest... online communities just do that kind of thing so very well, don't they. ;) (though fandom has the best words for them, I think, after having experienced the same in a couple of online and offline contexts!)

[penguin_attie]

Yeah, we do have the process well analyzed. Maybe it's because everyone always thinks of us as weird, we're so damn self-conscious we think it's only us when in fact it's universally human, only no one ever bothers to think about it.