Human beings as fans of outside work is nothing new: although modern society has the technology that allows large groups of these fans to gather, there is no doubt that fandom has been around a very long time. In fact, in Don Quixote—a novel written in two separately-published parts—the author had to write in a character who was initially created by a fan of the first part of the novel (Harris and Alexander 1998). This fan-made character then denounced his claim to being the true Don Quixote, and the novel meanders on—however, this is just one example of the many ways in which fan influence leaks into the production of films, novels, art, and other media.
Fans, by their very nature, tend to be outside the realm of the normal. While it is common for people to become fans of different kinds of culture—sports, for instance—other kinds of culture are still much more taboo for engagement (Bennett 2014: 6). Jenkins (2012) calls the engagement that a fan has with his or her work of choice as “scandalous” (16). Similarly, Jenkins postulates that it is, perhaps, in human nature to assume that the aesthetic and cultural predilections that occur at any given moment are “universal and eternal” (Jenkins 2012: 16). It is important to understand, of course, for the purposes of discussion, how fans can change the very inherent nature of a text. Fans, according to those who study them, are not merely consumers: they play a very different and very specific role in the lifetime development and cultural meaning of a text (Jenkins 2012: 26). For Jenkins (2012), fans have moved beyond the role of consumers into a very different identity (21).
For Jenkins (2012)—and De Certeau, who Jenkins quotes extensively—fans are a very specific set of people who absorb cultural text and grasp meaning from these texts that might not have necessarily been part of the design when the piece was created (27). Fandom, especially invested fandom, is not a passive act. Fandom is also an active from of production: fans might produce all manner of work related to their favorite texts. They will often meet other fans, dress up like favorite characters, and even write fan-fiction regarding their favorite characters and their readings of the text (Schimmel, Harrington, and Bielby 2007: 585). Although these individuals might sometimes have a different understanding of the text, they are not misreading or misunderstanding the text: instead, they are integrating the text into their world.
Henry Jenkins suggests that fans violate the norms of society—that is, that fans tend to violate cultural hierarchies and demonstrate resistance to the dominant social and cultural paradigm (Jenkins 2012). Jenkins (2012) writes, “The stereotypical conception off the fan, while not without a limited factual bias, amounts to a projection of anxieties about the violation of dominant cultural hierarchies. The fans’ transgression of bourgeois taste and disruption of dominant cultural hierarchies ensures that their preferences are seen as abnormal and threatening” (17). Jenkins (2012) suggests that those who are the most threatened by these transgressions are those who are traditionally seen as the arbiters of taste in a society. This might be, after all, why there are many parents who find the world of fandom as particularly troublesome; it is both an engaging world and one that lies distinctly outside the traditional boundaries of society, something that many parents dislike and fear (Bennett 2014: 6).
The dissolution and destruction of hierarchies is something that the dominant group in society will always and has always feared. Whenever the hegemonic group in power loses power, there is a response against the cultural disruption. Sometimes there is a movement against media that is deemed to be inappropriate, obscene, or lascivious; sometimes it is media that is deemed to be inappropriate for children or other viewers (Radway 1984). One of the important things that Jenkins (2012) does when the researcher investigates the meaning behind fan texts is ignores the texts themselves; anything can become a text, image, or other form of media with a fan following. While some texts or films appeal to more people and have a wider fan base—there is nothing inherently unique about texts, media, films, or other syndications that develop fan bases.
Indeed, the idea that fan bases might be attracted to nearly anything is, in and of itself, quite an interesting concept. Fans can and do become attracted to very strange media: the young male attraction to the television show My Little Pony is a perfect example. While My Little Pony was never designed to appeal to this particular demographic, it became popular; its popularity, unfortunately, came with something of a price. While the show is made for young girls, much of the fan art that has been created is certainly not created for young girls—and any online foray into this particular community can become disturbing quite quickly.
Both Jenkins (2012) and Radway (1984) suggest that for most readers, there is not an inherent reading or “truth” in any text. Radway (1984) writes, “Literary meaning is the property neither of fixed and stable texts nor free and independent readers but of interpretive communities that are responsible both for the shape of the reader’s activities and for the texts those activities produce” (55). Radway (1984) suggests that many women read romances to “escape” their everyday lives. While many fans participate in communities, the women who read romances are different in some ways: they are reading to escape their everyday lives, and they do this action alone. They use the plasticity of their fandom to create the perfect escape in their heads; they do not necessarily need to share that experience for it to be valuable (Radway 1984: 60).
If escape is indeed the end goal of the romance reader, then the plasticity of the text is fundamentally important. Women who read romance novels have to find time to read these novels; they have to be able to set aside enough time and energy to invest in their own experiences. Resistance is inherent in both the literal and figurative escape that women seek—and sometimes achieve—through romance novels. Escape comes in many forms, and resistance is a constant theme in romance novels and in the words that women use to describe their experiences with romance novels.
It is important to note that Radway (1984) wrote her text on romance novels more than two decades ago. However, in the analysis Radway (1984) points to a “certain sadness” that all women who read romance novels seem to share; these women, who have experienced less than the ideal life, are using their romance novels to get away from their everyday disappointment and displeasure at their lot in life (60). It begs the question of whether fans of other types who use their fandom as an escape also experience sadness or lack of fulfillment in other parts of their lives.
The idea that people could rewrite a text and create a new ending to replace a disliked one is nothing new. Fan fiction and sharing of characters and settings has been happening in literature for many years, as can be seen through the previously-discussed example of Don Quixote. This is not the only example, of course; the characters of the Sherlock Holmes universe have been used time and again by many different writers to create new stories and new adventures. In some ways, once these characters are on the page, they become the property of the world: there is no containing an idea or a character once that character has been created. While there might be restrictions that will keep others from making money from an original idea, fandom itself—borrowing from something loved to create something new—seems to be an inherent part of human nature.
In The People vs. George Lucas, director Alexandre Philippe suggests that George Lucas owes his fans more than he has been giving them in recent years (The People vs. George Lucas 2010). It is important to note that this documentary was made before the newest film was released; however, Philippe’s primary contention in the documentary is that there are two sides to the Star Wars franchise; he suggests that both sides need each other equally, and neither would be very functional without the other (The People vs. George Lucas 2010).
Fans are notorious for their continued analysis of their media of choice. Fans are known to watch and re-watch—read and re-read. They will consume media about and related to their chosen franchise however and whenever they can, particularly the most devoted fans. The People vs. George Lucas (2010) demonstrates that the fans have become something of a problem as well as a potential driving force for the Star Wars franchise; if a director or author creates something that the fans consider to be less than ideal, they will often be extremely critical about the new piece of media. This is likely because they are very engaged with the material at a personal level, and they have constructed their own version of the media in their imaginations.
Director Alexandre Philippe, for instance, considers himself a fan of Star Wars; however, he clearly dislikes some of the changes that the director made when he was re-mastering the series. The fans have asked for changes and re-mastering to the original series, as they are unhappy with many of the changes made to the original films. Although Lucas controls the way the franchise will develop, fans are heavily invested in the way it will develop as well.
With the advent of social media, fans are playing a more significant role in the development of film and other media than ever before. Fan art and fiction is widely available, and the Internet allows people of similar interests but different locations to gather virtually. It seems highly unlikely that the trend towards large-scale fandom will change in the near future.
Works Cited
Bennett, Lucy. "Tracing Textual Poachers: Reflections on the development of fan studies and digital fandom." The Journal of Fandom Studies 2.1 (2014): 5-20.
Harris, Cheryl, and Alison Alexander. Theorizing fandom: Fans, subculture, and identity. Hampton Pr, 1998.
Jenkins, Henry. Textual poachers: Television fans and participatory culture. Routledge, 2012.
Radway, Janice. "Women read the romance." (1984).
Schimmel, Kimberly S., C. Lee Harrington, and Denise D. Bielby. "Keep your fans to yourself: the disjuncture between sport studies' and pop culture studies' perspectives on fandom." Sport in Society 10.4 (2007): 580-600.
The People V. George Lucas. United States: Alexandre O. Philippe, 2010. DVD.
