The Hierarchy of Fandom: What Does It Mean to be a “True” Fan?
Fandoms are a culturally constructed phenomenon set on setting distinctions between one fan from the next. It can be defined as a “collective of people organized socially around their shared appreciation of a pop culture object or objects” (Baym, 2007, cited in McCudden, 2011). he amount of media consumed in relation to your fanhood is dependent upon the amount of time you are willing to commit. In this essay, I will explore what it means to be a fan, and whether or not one’s expression of fandom equals one’s validity as a fan.
What Is a Fan and Fanhood?
To begin discussing fanhood, one has to define what it means to be a fan. A fan is a shortened version of ‘fanatic,’ which comes from the Latin root word ‘fanum’ meaning “temple” (Fan, n.d). A fan is someone who is “marked by excessive enthusiasm and often intense uncritical devotion” (Fanatic, n.d.). The first recorded use of fan was in 1885 in the Kansas City Times, where Ted Sullivan, American baseball player, cited being a ‘fan’ of baseball (Snyder, 2011).
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Henry Jenkins, media scholar, and fan researcher defined the two by a ‘watcher’ casually enjoying by reading/watching something, while a fan is someone who looks for more. This “more” is reading more on the subject, watching behind-the-scenes videos, and doing anything that can lead you to engage in more dialogue with others who feel the same, the fandom (Jenkins, 2006). Fans are defined by participatory actions and gathering more information than the average watcher. There are varying levels of how much information one can
Feil, Stuart. "The Passion of the Fan." ADWEEK. N.p., 28 Jan. 2013. Web. 3 Dec. 2013.
the wild antics of the die hard fans. In my essay I will try and attempt to describe as
Sport fans, sometimes also called sport devotees, followers, or supporters, are persons who are enthusiastically devoted to a particular athlete, team or sport. They may show their enthusiasm by often attending sporting events or watch on television, being members of a fan club, follow sport news through newspapers, online websites, and creating fanzines. Their disposition is often such that they will experience a game or event by living through their favored players or teams. These behaviors manifest itself in different ways. To enable better understanding of these behavioral patterns, we have to classify these sports fans into groups based on their devotion to teams: fair-weather fans, bandwagon and the super-fans.
In his article “Star Trek Rerun, Reread, Rewritten,” Henry Jenkins addresses the function of fandoms, more specifically the writing of fan-fiction, and further in the context of the Star Trek fandom. He claims that fans are “textual poachers” who take pieces of the original text that they deem as worthy, and rework, or improve areas that they find problematic or contradictory to the overall purpose of the piece. This “poaching” that is transformed works into fan-fiction are heavily written by females, at least in the Star Trek fandom. Jenkins states that this is due to the fact that women have a rather limited and highly stereotyped portrayal in science fiction. Thus, in writing fan-fiction, women are able to express themselves and their own
The term “fan” was originally used to describe sports fans during the nineteenth century and was later adopted by science fiction enthusiasts in the 1920s. The term “fan,” however, is used for describing a type of person who is enthusiastic, or fanatic about a certain subject. Popular fan culture, nicknamed “fandoms,” have become an integral part of society in many countries, and have connected people sharing a common interest through online communities where they can freely discuss fan related topics. Popular fandoms today include Directioners, Beliebers, and VIPs. People who are part of fandoms usually show their devotion by participating in fan conventions such as Comicon, writing fan mail, creating fan art, or by promoting their interests to others. Being a fan also comes with the responsibility of changing one’s lifestyle in order to accommodate time and energy into the fandom. Fan culture also offers people the chance to feel passionate about something or someone in order to satisfy the emotional needs they lack from their daily life.
Fanfiction is fiction literature about a medium such as a TV show, movie, or book, written by fans of the medium. It generally consists of many different genres and locations, but uses characters specific to the medium chosen. One of the most prominent parts of fanfiction culture is shipping or more specifically slash shipping. Shipping is the act of supporting two or more characters, personalities, or real people in a romantic relation-“ship” regardless of whether the relationship exists in real life or not; for example, “Bill Clinton/Hilary Clinton,” “Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky,” and “Bill Clinton/Michelle Obama/Monica Lewinsky” are all “ships”. Similarly, slash shipping is the act of shipping two characters, personalities, or real people of the same sex regardless of their original sexual orientation. While slash fiction in LGBT terms refers to any gay or lesbian fiction, fanfiction terms differ slightly in that slash fiction refers to gay fanfiction (as opposed to femme-slash which refers to lesbian fiction). On popular fanfiction archiving websites, simple searches show that more than 70 percent of all fanfiction is male slash fiction (“M/M Tag Search”). This abundance in male slash fiction brings up a puzzling question: why do so many fans enjoy it?
The importance of fans is vital because in addition to skill talent and hardwork, fans greatly affect how a team performs in their games. They affect the way a player plays because fans have a way of getting into their players heads and the opponent's head, even the referees are affected by the fans and we rarely notice the importance. In 2001 a Sports Ethics article “ The Ideal Fan” by Myles Dichter he explains the importance of fans and connection between fans
We all know this guy. A Bandwagon Fan jumps from team to team based on popularity. If their supposed favorite team is struggling, they’ll move on to another team. A lot of the time, they don’t begin to root for a team until the playoffs. A Bandwagon Fan also follows their favorite player around. For example, when LeBron James signed a contract with the Miami Heat, his fans from all over the world immediately claimed to be Miami Heat fans. Most of them didn’t even know who the other team members were. These fan bases seem to pop up overnight and usually don’t last very long. Want to know if someone is a bandwagon fan? Just ask them a question about the team’s history. Chances are, they won’t know the answer,
Die hard fans go to every game and do not miss a single second of the game. I consider myself a die hard fan because I only talk about the Chicago Bulls, and I believe they are the premier team in the NBA. Moreover, my brother can be implemented in this category because he never misses a Miami Heat game. Die hard fans know each and everything about the team. Usually, these fans paint their faces, put up stickers on their cars, and own the team merchandise. Die hard fans only talk about their favorite team and they think their team is the best team in the world. The other teams would be considered trash and the die hard fans defend their team no matter the circumstances. Teams love to possess fans like these because it
What is a baseball fan? The word "fan" is an abbreviation of the word "fanatic," meaning "insane." In the case of baseball fans, the term is very appropriate. They behave insanely, they are insane about baseball trivia, and they are insanely loyal.
Fan Culture is something that has been around for a while, but it the last twenty years, since the introduction of the Internet, it is also something that has changed dramatically. A fan is an enthusiast of something and now the Internet is a good home for fans to gather and build together a community of fans, a ‘Fandom’. The turn Fandom means a community of a group of people who all enjoy them same thing and the Internet has created a place for online communities. Fan Culture has irreversibly changed the media industry because of the ability share information and fan made created content. The creation of these online based communities have meant that people from all over the world can talk about the latest TV shows, movies, books, comics and other forms of content and create groups dedicated to them. The Internet has also become a platform for the creation of a collective community, where individuals who all have shared interests can go. “Fans uses of technologies bring a sense of playfulness to the work of active reading” (2010; 12). Digital Fandoms are user-led forum of content creation, the fans create a number of things; fan fiction, fan blogs, fan made videos, fan art work, wiki leaks. The fans create a whole new life, another side of the TV show, film or book, that is complicity run and used by the fans. These fan made creation do not have to stick to what is canon in the show and can do what they wish with the character and the storylines. However is this an okay thing to do, Henry Jenkins refers to the fans who create these things are ‘Textual Poachers’. Those fans are now active interpreters instead of passive consumers. In this view the fans are poaching the created content of the writer. The fans have power to create t...
There are many ways to define popular culture. Many individuals have grappled with the question what is popular culture? And how to critically analyze and deconstruct the meanings. Looking at the root words of popular culture is where to begin. Raymond Williams states ‘popular’ means: “well liked by many people" or “culture actually made for the people themselves (Storey, p.5). This is part with the word ‘culture’ combine to look at how the two words have been connect by theoretical work within social and historical context. John Storey approaches popular culture in six categories, they are as followed: “Popular culture is simply culture that is widely favoured or well liked by many people”, Popular culture is “the culture that is left over after we have decided what is high culture”, Popular culture is “mass culture”, “Popular culture is the culture that originates from ‘the people.” and “Popular culture as a site of struggle
In today’s day and age we live in a society obsessed with celebrity culture. This however, is not a new addiction; our society’s fascination with celebrity culture has been around for decades. Through the years, we’ve seen fandom come in various forms, shapes and sizes. From the groupies of the 60s, to the more recent digital-followers, one thing common among all fans is the pedestal on which they’ve put their favorite celebrity. Some people would argue that fans are not only the most important part of a celebrity’s life, but fans are quintessential in their success. Fans admire them, follow their every move: physical or electronic, and purchase anything and everything that might bring them in looking/feeling more like their desired celebrity. Many experts even believe that fan and fan-clubs often resemble religions. One can easily note the similarities between fans and a religious cult; from worshipping to organizing conventions and event recruiting new followers. To some it might even sound like a disorder, and Dr. Lynn McCutcheon after her intense research, was the first one to coin the term: (CWS) Celebrity Worship Syndrome. According to Psychology Today, CWS can be described as a mental-disorder where an individual becomes completely obsessed with the details of the personal life of a celebrity (Griffiths). A celebrity, as defined by Mark Griffiths, can be any person who is present in the ‘public eye’, including Politicians, authors, and journalists, but according to Dr. McCutcheon research they are more likely to be someone from the world of television, film and/or pop music. Continuing on Justin Bieber’s ad campaign, this paper examines the peculiar relationship between consumers and God-like celebrity figures. It showcase...
Who are fans? Why are they around and what is their purpose? To answer that question as clearly as possible, I had to take the time to think. What kind of fan am I? Fans are everywhere. Sports enthusiasts, in particular, love a specific sport or a certain club/team. They come from every country and support every possible activity. I'd like to think that sports fans are there to support their favorite teams and show their pride. Take the world's largest sport, football (also known as soccer in the United States). This game has the largest participation in the world and has the largest fan based communities. These followers are not there just because they want to see people play; it is a way of life. Among the most predominate soccer teams is Manchester United. This English club team has the rowdiest soccer fans I have ever seen. We thought that American Football fans are crazy? Well just think about how extreme they are with their entire bodies painted and the chants and cheers to support the...
Fandom is a term that refers to a subculture that consists of fans who share a feeling of camaraderie with other fans who share a common interest. Those that consider themselves to be part of a fandom are typically interested in even minor details of those interests, spend a large amount of their time on their interest and are usually members of social media sites that allow them to discuss this interest in detail. This is what differentiates them from those who only show a casual interest.