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necessarian) wrote2018-01-01 07:00 pm
necessarian) wrote2018-01-01 07:00 pm
Entry tags:
[Archiving] On Casual Fandom & On the Gratuity of Fandom
Originally posted: 19.11.'15
Originally posted: 23.3.'16
early this year, i overheard a conversation between two people about star trek. it was pretty normal, until one of them expressed confusion when the other started talking about romulans. i’ll never forget the inflection, the tone of his voice when he indignantly said, “you don’t know who the ROMULANS are??” within minutes, they’d cleared it up as a misunderstanding–the second person spoke english as a second language, and even though he spoke it well in conversation, he’d never watched star trek in english.
i’ve personally never watched any star trek and have only the vaguest idea of who or what a romulan might be, but that conversation has stuck with me. the first person’s initial reaction to the other’s ignorance is something we see a lot of in fan culture, this sort of deep-seated belief that there ought to be no such thing as a casual fan, that if you don’t know anything about something you can’t be considered a fan at all.
tumblr-based fandom is very good at making fun of this sort of fan. we easily mock the neckbearded, fedora-wearing men who live in basements and get into heated debates on obscure forums about even more obscure details. our fandom culture has acknowledged that this sort of engagement with fandom can be seriously toxic and elitist.
what we have not acknowledged is that it’s all too easy to ignore your own problems when there’s a scapegoat at hand. while this sort of rejection of the casual fan is widely recognised in the predominantly male curative fandom culture, tumblr fandom has exactly the same problem, and absolutely no-one is talking about it.
we, as a community, have a problem with casual fans. and when i say we, i don’t just mean tumblr fandom. i mean literally all fandom. elitism is an unfortunate hand-in-hand partner with fandom, and in many ways it always has been, but that won’t change unless we make an active effort to change it, and it isn’t negated just because we recognise it as unhealthy in some parts of fandom culture. instead of chiding people for not knowing specific details about a fandom, or for only having seen the film and not read the books, we need to embrace the fact that everyone engages with media differently and that, amazingly, people are allowed to make uninformed comments. it’s okay if someone doesn’t know everything about something. if they want to engage more and learn those fine details that turn a casual fan into a hardcore fan, then good on them. if they couldn’t care less and are just happy engaging on a casual basis, then good on them too.
look, i’m saying this as a person who once memorised every single house in westeros–knowing shit isn’t the be all and end all of fandom. you know what else? i’ve forgotten most of the houses i memorised. does that make me any less of a fan, just because my engagement has become more casual? or does it just make me a different sort of fan? embracing casual fandom as no less valid than intense fandom would make our corner of fandom even more different from elitist curative fandom.
i’ve personally never watched any star trek and have only the vaguest idea of who or what a romulan might be, but that conversation has stuck with me. the first person’s initial reaction to the other’s ignorance is something we see a lot of in fan culture, this sort of deep-seated belief that there ought to be no such thing as a casual fan, that if you don’t know anything about something you can’t be considered a fan at all.
tumblr-based fandom is very good at making fun of this sort of fan. we easily mock the neckbearded, fedora-wearing men who live in basements and get into heated debates on obscure forums about even more obscure details. our fandom culture has acknowledged that this sort of engagement with fandom can be seriously toxic and elitist.
what we have not acknowledged is that it’s all too easy to ignore your own problems when there’s a scapegoat at hand. while this sort of rejection of the casual fan is widely recognised in the predominantly male curative fandom culture, tumblr fandom has exactly the same problem, and absolutely no-one is talking about it.
we, as a community, have a problem with casual fans. and when i say we, i don’t just mean tumblr fandom. i mean literally all fandom. elitism is an unfortunate hand-in-hand partner with fandom, and in many ways it always has been, but that won’t change unless we make an active effort to change it, and it isn’t negated just because we recognise it as unhealthy in some parts of fandom culture. instead of chiding people for not knowing specific details about a fandom, or for only having seen the film and not read the books, we need to embrace the fact that everyone engages with media differently and that, amazingly, people are allowed to make uninformed comments. it’s okay if someone doesn’t know everything about something. if they want to engage more and learn those fine details that turn a casual fan into a hardcore fan, then good on them. if they couldn’t care less and are just happy engaging on a casual basis, then good on them too.
look, i’m saying this as a person who once memorised every single house in westeros–knowing shit isn’t the be all and end all of fandom. you know what else? i’ve forgotten most of the houses i memorised. does that make me any less of a fan, just because my engagement has become more casual? or does it just make me a different sort of fan? embracing casual fandom as no less valid than intense fandom would make our corner of fandom even more different from elitist curative fandom.
Originally posted: 23.3.'16
something i’ve thought about a lot lately is the growing realisation that more people read fanfic than i thought. i don’t have to go long in a fandom-related conversation with an IRL friend before fic comes up. it’s tentative, a sort of testing-the-waters at first, but when you establish that you’re both aware of the existence of this wonderful, secretive world, the conversation becomes a lot easier. but there’s still this boundary where i hold myself back from saying, i create this! i write fanfic!, because for a multitude of reasons, this is still embarrassing.
i remember talking to a friend a while ago and she confided in me, with great ceremony and after a long discussion, that she writes fanfic. this was a big deal for her to share this, and it would’ve been a big deal for me too, only in that moment the waters had been tested and i had found that i could not only swim but walk the surface, and i said, unbelievably excited, “me too!” but moments like this are rare, because where my friend was courageous, i am often not, and i hold back this facet of my life that is so inextricably a part of me, and yet so private.
it bothers me that fanfiction is seen as a lesser artform. i see a lot of very positive posts about fic writing, but they ruin themselves for me by bringing real-world publishing into the picture. yes, lots of fanfic writers want to become published authors of original fiction. i am one of them, embarking on my first proper original novel this year. but i do not for a moment conflate my original writing with my fan writing.
another person–another person with whom i didn’t take the conversation that step further, didn’t add, i create this!–said to me that fanfiction is inherently gratuitous. i think she was right, but perhaps not in the way she meant. fanfic is, by nature, building on something that already exists, and remodelling it to suit our exact interests. it is a labour of love, and in a way that published fiction can never be, it is a community exercise. if you are publishing fanfic, you are brave, and i am proud of you. you are taking part in a community of people creating masterpieces, because they want to.
i apply the same writing practices to my fanfiction and my original fiction–i spend five minutes stuck on one word, trying to find the perfect fit. i make spreadsheets and keep notes on my phone to plan and worldbuild and brainstorm with myself. i treat all my writing as something i love. but fanfiction will always be this separate realm for me, more than a hobby but less than an occupation, and i think in many ways this separation is down to the way it is viewed as shameful and embarrassing to talk about it in public.
what surprises me the most is that i don’t want this separation to go away. i like keeping my fanfic and original fiction separate. while i’m operating in an environment where i have to be conscious that i am a recreational embarrassment, i have found my niche. so long as there are people out there who will mock fanfiction authors and treat their labours of love as trivial, indulgent–but of course, what is wrong with being trivial and indulgent if you want to be?–so long as people make it a bad thing, i keep my fanfiction private. i tell my friends i’m writing a novel–what i don’t say is that i’m writing many novels, and have been for years.
one day, i’ll be able to say, i create this! until then, i will keep creating. and when, or if, i can tell people about this type of writing that i love so much, it will still be separate from my original fiction. because fanfiction is shared, measured not in sales and demographics but in comments and kudos, and it is gratuitous, it is self-indulgent. and i love it that way.
i remember talking to a friend a while ago and she confided in me, with great ceremony and after a long discussion, that she writes fanfic. this was a big deal for her to share this, and it would’ve been a big deal for me too, only in that moment the waters had been tested and i had found that i could not only swim but walk the surface, and i said, unbelievably excited, “me too!” but moments like this are rare, because where my friend was courageous, i am often not, and i hold back this facet of my life that is so inextricably a part of me, and yet so private.
it bothers me that fanfiction is seen as a lesser artform. i see a lot of very positive posts about fic writing, but they ruin themselves for me by bringing real-world publishing into the picture. yes, lots of fanfic writers want to become published authors of original fiction. i am one of them, embarking on my first proper original novel this year. but i do not for a moment conflate my original writing with my fan writing.
another person–another person with whom i didn’t take the conversation that step further, didn’t add, i create this!–said to me that fanfiction is inherently gratuitous. i think she was right, but perhaps not in the way she meant. fanfic is, by nature, building on something that already exists, and remodelling it to suit our exact interests. it is a labour of love, and in a way that published fiction can never be, it is a community exercise. if you are publishing fanfic, you are brave, and i am proud of you. you are taking part in a community of people creating masterpieces, because they want to.
i apply the same writing practices to my fanfiction and my original fiction–i spend five minutes stuck on one word, trying to find the perfect fit. i make spreadsheets and keep notes on my phone to plan and worldbuild and brainstorm with myself. i treat all my writing as something i love. but fanfiction will always be this separate realm for me, more than a hobby but less than an occupation, and i think in many ways this separation is down to the way it is viewed as shameful and embarrassing to talk about it in public.
what surprises me the most is that i don’t want this separation to go away. i like keeping my fanfic and original fiction separate. while i’m operating in an environment where i have to be conscious that i am a recreational embarrassment, i have found my niche. so long as there are people out there who will mock fanfiction authors and treat their labours of love as trivial, indulgent–but of course, what is wrong with being trivial and indulgent if you want to be?–so long as people make it a bad thing, i keep my fanfiction private. i tell my friends i’m writing a novel–what i don’t say is that i’m writing many novels, and have been for years.
one day, i’ll be able to say, i create this! until then, i will keep creating. and when, or if, i can tell people about this type of writing that i love so much, it will still be separate from my original fiction. because fanfiction is shared, measured not in sales and demographics but in comments and kudos, and it is gratuitous, it is self-indulgent. and i love it that way.