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Fandom History Resources

comtessedebussy:

At Destielcon, I was on a panel on The Evolution of Fan Fiction (which quickly turned into a panel on simply The Evolution of Fandom) with the wonderful Dori (@obsessionisaperfume), and I was asked by a few audience members afterwards to give them some resources to read more about fandom history, the study of fanfiction, and the like. I promised to make a post, and here, finally, it is, starting with general sources and then getting specific about fandoms. 

General Sources

Textual Poachers - Henry Jenkins 
If you read one book about fandom, this should be the book. Written back in 1992, it was one of the first books to really take fandom (including fan fiction, slash fiction, fanzines, and the like) seriously, to analyze it in a completely respectful way, and to come up with a lot of terminology to talk about how fandom functions. Jenkins talks about how being a fan tends to be looked down upon (and the way that these criticisms are gendered), studies the way that fans combine knowledge gleaned from many episodes put together to create “metatexts” of the show they love, and devotes a chapter to slash, where he very eloquently theorizes the way that women write slash fiction to, in many ways, undermine patriarchal, heterosexual norms of gender, gender roles, and sexuality. Basically, everything you’ve ever heard or suspected about fandom, you can probably find here, said eloquently by Jenkins. 

Henry Jenkins’ Blog
If Textual Poachers isn’t enough for you, then Jenkins also has a blog, where he posts about fandom all the time. He even has a post about Supernatural. 

Fic: How Fan Fiction is Taking Over the World - Anne Jamison
This is an excellent introduction to the history of fan fiction for the lay reader. Jamison’s a college professor who studies fan fic for a living, and she gives a history of it starting in the middle ages and proceeding to the modern day, including talking about how various forms of media (the internet, television, etc…) have influenced the way fan fic is written and the way communities form around it. Also, she interviews a lot of authors and other people who were around in fandom for a long time. 

Fan Fiction and Fan Communities in the Age of the Internet - ed. Kristina Busse
This is like the 21st century version of Textual Poachers: it talks about fandom, the nature of slash, the way that fic is created, gender, masculinity, romance, performativity, all that stuff - but takes into account internet communities and emerging forms of communication and media. This essay collection has all the big names in fandom studies right now.

Organization for Transformative Works’ Journal 
Use AO3? It’s hosted by the Organization for Transformative Works, which also published a journal that studies fandom and fan fiction (called transformative work) in all its incarnation. They even published an issue dedicated to Supernatural back in 2008(?) and all their essays are accessible online, for free, on their search-able website. Search Supernatural and you’ll get loads of hits.

Fanlore
This is the wiki hosted by the Organization for Transformative Works, and if you’re ever in doubt about a piece of fandom history, check there instead. They have extensive pages on most slash ships, the history of slash, shipping, fanzines, etc….and a lot of art and media files. They have the very first slash fic ever written up there.  

As If - Michael Saler
This book is ostensibly about the change in the way in which the imagination was perceived in the 19th century, but really it’s more about the way that ficitonal worlds started to be perceived as “virtual realities” that could be communally inhabited in the 19th century, and the first “worlds” that were examples of this: Sherlock Holmes, Tolkien, and Lovecraft. An absolutely fascinating read. 

Book Series, Publishers, Etc

Popular Culture and Philosophy: These books can be hit or miss, but a lot contain insteresting essays about TV shows and books with accessible philosophy.

SmartPop: I absolutely love SmartPop. They published the above book on Fic, a Supernatural collection of essays called In the Hunt (reviewed below), Star Wars on Trial (a book of debates about issues in Star Trek like sexism, racism, the extended universe, etc..)  and books of essays on pretty much ever TV show ever. They are written to be really accessible, yet still contain really interesting insights into a lot of shows. A lot of the essays have humor and are written tongue in cheek and they don’t just focus on shows; they focus on fandom as well. 

McFarland - They’re a more academic publisher, but they do occasionally put out books about stuff like popular culture and specific TV shows. Check out their website for various titles. 

Intellect Press- They have a “Fan Phenomena” series where they dedicate a book to the “fan phenomenon”/fandom of a lot of shows, books, and fandoms, including Supernatural, Buffy, Sherlock Holmes, Twilight (blech) and a lot of other things. 

Star Trek fandom
Star Trek was kind of the “original” media fandom - the first “real” fandom around a TV show. It was also the fandom that created slash fiction - i.e. if you’re crying over that male pairing, it’s thanks to Kirk and Spock and how very not platonic they were. 

Star Trek Lives!
Written sometime in the 1970s by three of the big names in the Star Trek fandom, this talks about the organizing of the very first Star Trek convention, the making of the show, a visit to the set when the last episode was being filmed, and Star Trek fandom back in the 60s and 70s, when media fandom was just getting started.

Get a Life! - William Shatner
Note: the title is ironic. William Shatner puts together an amazing book after going undercover at conventions (literally) for a year, talking to fans, figuring out why they love the show and are so passionate about it, and writing a book about fandom. This is one of the most respectful and interesting books on fandom I’ve ever read. 

Supernatural 

In the Hunt
Part of the aforementioned SmartPop series up there, it was published right after season 3, and yet despite being published so early in the series has SO MANY great insights into the show, its themes, like family, good and evil, etc….there’s also an article about fan fiction, and an essay that predicts (at the end of SEASON 3) that Sam is basically Lucifer incarnate (which is pretty close to reality imo). 

Supernatural Issue of Transformative Works and Cultures
See above for my description of the Journal for Transformative Works. This issue is dedicated especially to SPN.

Fangasm! 
I”m sure you guys have heard about this book and its companion. It’s written by two SPN fan ladies who are also academics, who write about the difficulty of navigating the line between fandom and academia, and give a really interesting insight into the show. They also go to a lot of cons and blog about it. 

Sherlock Holmes Fandom
With Sherlock Holmes, there is a LOT of history - more than a hundred years, so I really can’t even begin to give a good list of sources. Obviously check out Saler’s “As If” (above) for an overview, and message me if you are interested in a particular area of Sherlock Holmes fandom, because there is just SO MUCH content. 

Names in Fan/Fandom Studies
These are the people doing absolutely spectacular work in the field right now. If you want to know more about fandom history, fan fiction, fandom, and the academic study of it all, just read everything these people have ever written. A lot of them have contributed essays to various journals or essay collections; these aren’t always accessible for free/in the public domain. If you search for these people and explore their bibliography through academia.edu or other sources and find an article of theirs that strikes your fancy, I likely have it saved on my computer so just shoot me an ask! 

This is just to get you started. If you want a very long bibliography of, like, every book on fandom studies and media ever written, check out the bibliography here (this is where I got started). If you need very specific sources, feel free to message me, as I can likely direct you in the right direction or give you suggestions, because it’s honestly impossible to include everything here. There’s a lot of fandoms I missed and a lot of titles I didn’t include, because it can get overwhelming.