A brief fandom history
My fandom history, that is. The following is part of an assignment I did for my Women and Popular Culture class at school. I would love it if you posted your own stories of fandom in the comments. Fair warning though, I did submit the url to this post along with the assignment, so my prof might be looking in at some point
( Read more... )
Comments 11
Reply
Sorry, I should have clarified the fandom demographics thing more. I was referring in particular to the section of fandom that writes fanfiction. In particular slash. Why this section? Because that is where most of my participation/interaction happens. My understanding is that primarily slash writers/consumers are women. Though that does not mean men don't participate in that subset of fannish behaviour, just that you don't see them very often.
It is interesting that you indicate fanfiction on a "professional" level. My first instinct was to ask why you thought there might be that divide, but instead I will argue that if one is producing work on that level, it is now sanctioned by the powers that be, and it is no longer considered a fanwork.
Nit-picky detail: Ackles totally got started on Days of Our Lives, or I suppose it could be argued Dark Angel. ;P
Reply
Reply
The author also wrote HP fic (Harry/Draco, to be specific), so I got into that, and that was the next... several years of my life. It was the first fandom/pairing I got really, really invested in. For awhile in 2006-2007 or so I got more busy IRL so fandom activity decreased drastically, but then I got into BSG in May of last year and Castiel got me into SPN fandom late last year. I'm still here, shipping Dean/Castiel like it's my boyfriend.
Reply
As I admitted on Katrina's journal, I also got into HP through fic. I think I was reading some sort of Buffy crossover... It was my gateway drug. Before I knew it I was reading straight up HP fics. And then these movies were coming out? Previously I had tried to read my sister's copy of the Philosopher's Stone, but couldn't get through the first chapter, so I put it back on the shelf and ignored it.
Flash forward several years, I'm reading all this fic, these crazy movies are actually pretty good, and right after the 3rd movie came out (See, I wanted to watch the movie before reading the book incase the movie was ruined by the book being better), I read books 1-5 straight through. They were... okay? I still like fic better, but I wonder now if that has more to do with the sense of community that comes from fandom rather than writing ability. Nah, I still think the fic is better even without the entirety of fandom behind it :D
Reply
Reply
Hmm I wonder if there's fic out there for the Belgariad? *goes searching*
Reply
WELL.
The beginnings of my fandom career took play many eons ago at a place called sheroescentral.net. A lot of my lj friends are from there, even though I stopped posting on the board after first year university. It had a lot of focus on ~current events~ and discussion of feminism and was an amazing liberal escape from my high school life.
But it also had a lot of discussion on books, movies, tv shows. Anyway, HP was the first fandom that I ever read fic for/created ~dream casting~ for/wrote fic for and then I started using my lj more regularly and three years ago I discovered ficmixes (OMG HAS IT REALLY BEEN THAT LONG?!) and I haven't looked back!
Although I have just just just come to the realisation that I stopped posting on sheroes because of how popular Twilight was there. HAHAHA. WOW.
Reply
Oh Twilight. I kind of forgot that it will probably awkwardly come up again at Thanksgiving when my Aunt asks me what I think of those Vampire books. Then I will rant about complex female characters who don't have stalker vampire boyfriends and well, have a personality. And she will reply with something about "well, at least kids are reading".
Reply
Leave a comment