Research!

[featherynscale]

I need some help from the flist on this one, particularly those of you who consider yourself fannish. I'm interested in what the experience of fandom is like for people, generally, I think. If you could take a moment and comment below, I'd appreciate it.

What I'm particularly interested in knowing about are things like: how/when do you know you are a fan? What are your criteria for determining who is and is not a part of a fandom? What sorts of activities, if any, are you likely to participate in due to or related to your fandom? Does it affect your language or other behavior outside of strictly fandom-related activities? How does your fandom play out in your day-to-day life, if at all? That sort of thing.

Seriously. Talk to me about fandom. It's for a class I'm working on.

Thanks!

Comments

Fandom

[gamera-spinning.livejournal.com]

I guess criteria for determining fandom is going out of your way to make sure you catch the show or read the book or see the movie when it comes out.
I am a huge fan of Babylon 5, which means that before the days of PVRs, I used to record episodes of Babylon 5 when they first aired (before anyone else knew what it was). I would watch them while they recorded and often play them back during the week to pick up nuances, foreshadowing, music and even (I am such a geek) lighting and staging choices. I did this because I loved the show, I was intrigued by what it was attempting - creating a novel for television, and I really liked the idea that people had to follow it if they wanted to know what was going on. A fan was, to me, someone who cared enough to learn who the characters were, what the backstory was, and who hung in for the arc of the show.

Now, I am not the sort of guy who makes B5 props or costumes. I play and run roleplaying games, but I've never felt the need to pick up the Babylon 5 RPG. However, I have had the rare pleasure of seeing the creator of the show, J. Michael Straczynski, at the October Necronomicon convention in Tampa, FL, some years back. That was great fun.

I have not read the Babylon 5 spinoff novels, but I do listen to the new fan-created Babylon 5 podcast.

I think one of the things that fans do for actors and writers is that they follow their work. This gives them a reason to actually dig the fans and a support base for their popularity, and almost certainly a validation for their efforts.

I have friends that are Farscape, Battlestar Galactica and Firefly fans and I don't even blink anymore when they say "Frell", "Frack" or "Fei fei de piyan!" (okay, the last one doesn't happen that often, but I do know folks who swear in Chinese).

I can also heartily recommend "Xenogenesis: An Essay" by Harlan Ellison (found in Edgeworks 1, which I own and can lend). In this essay, which was delivered to fandom at Westercon, Harlan provides a collection of dark insights and true stories of the weird shit that fans do from the words of several popular authors. It is a lollapalooza, and definitely worth your time if you are interested in capturing the dark as well as the light side of fandom.

[diermuid.livejournal.com]

My opinion, a fan may watch a show regularly, but fandom is when you reformat your LJ with screen caps from it.

Of course I dislike everything, so I'm just guessing. 8-)

[brandy22kc.livejournal.com]

I think fandom is where you go out of your way to watch a show or try to catch every part of that show, i belive there are diffent levels one example is i'm a big fan of slip knot but when i went to the concert there were people who were obsevive about it like knew ever work dressed like them etc, things i'm a big fan of are one my radio station (96.5 the buzz) i've personally meet every dj more than once and pretty much dont listen to anther radio station, or watch desperat house wife and LOST every week since they began, but thats my level i think many people can go behond by like posters closths games etc

[greektoomey.livejournal.com]

First, I think a distinction must be made. There are fans, and there are Fans.

A fan is anyone who says, "I am a fan of _______." That's all it takes.

A Fan is someone who regularly fraternizes with other Fans under the pretext of a shared Fandom. Typically, this entails attending fan conventions, or otherwise traveling to meet individuals with whom one's only known common interest is a shared fandom.

(Disclaimer: This capitalization protocol is entirely my own invention, and should not be regarded as an established convention.)

Tonight I will be meeting with some local Browncoats (Firefly Fans) at a cafe to hang out and watch a few episodes of Firefly on the cafe's big-ass plasma tv. There will be eating, drinking, commentating on the episodes as they play (which is why we often show the subtitles), and occasionally talking back to the TV.

A couple weeks ago I met with a couple of Browncoats (though there should have been more) to attend the First Annual Science Fiction Short Film Festival. We had lunch, then watched the films, then afterwards went out for food & libations.

In my experience, fannish activities are for the most part no different from the activities of any other social group.

[diermuid.livejournal.com]

I'm a fan of... um... I liked a Dixie Chick song, I still listen to their CD on occasion. So that might make me a fandom level 1. Now if I were to dress like them, hit every concert in the 4-state area, have a special room enshrined to them... that would be fandom level 10. So I suppose it depends where on that sliding scale one wishes to concentrate.

[greektoomey.livejournal.com]

Or put more simply, a fan is anyone who says "I'm a fan." A Fan is someone whose social life involves shared fandom as a basis for fraternizing.

What class is this for?

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

Hmm. The one thing I would consider a true fandom thing for me is Harry Potter. Even so, I don't take things with a my-life-depends-on-it seriousness. Not even Remus/Sirius. Really.

I did the fanfic thing and the role play thing summer before last, but that was mainly to spend time with twixxa before she left for France and not so much because for the sake of the fandom itself. The stories were partially intended to be and wound up being good practice for writing my own stuff, as well. Any effects on language or other behaviors are more of a silly, inside-joke nature, mostly in the family, and are both meant and perceived as silliness. Not sure if that quite counts either.

All in all, I imagine I'm perceived by others, especially here on LJ, as being more fangirly than I really am.

Having said all that, one of my summer goals is going to be to create a Red Dwarf mood theme. :-)

[matchgirl42.livejournal.com]

I think it's a matter of where you place it (book, movie, tv show, band, etc) on your personal priority list. I can't even begin to list the amount of things I've blown off to catch an episode of a show(including a college-level quarterly exam), the things I've re-arranged to catch a movie, to go to *one* bookstore in particular because they were the only one in the area carrying a particular book. Not to mention the recent Kevin Sorbo sighting in Atlanta. *sigh* Remember how fixated I was for that one moment of fangirl squee? Yeah. That's Fandom, for me, anyway.

Pride also factors into it. For instance, there was no such thing as pride for me when I first saw the advance standee for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe over a year ago in the lobby of the AMC at Regency. I squeed loudly, I danced a little jig, I jumped up and down clapping my hands and squeeing at the top of my lungs. The employees looked at me like I had gone insane, but I couldn't have cared less.

And yes. There was much despair and depression over the final episode of Xena: Warrior Princess. And yes, I realize that it is/was a tv show. The ending still shook me to the core.

I find something almost mythological about it, too. Mythological in the sense that I learn from what I see/read/hear. I learn a lot, actually. For example, Before I ever kissed a boy(which was when I was 6, btw), I was studying Han and Leia in tESB intently, to try to learn how from what they did. Hee.

Uh, does Dave count??

[opaljax.livejournal.com]

I realized I was a Fan when he became my Husband, but he still doesn't know it.

What class is this for?

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Tell ya later. Don't want to influence response with people guessing what I'm after.