• The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art opened a new exhibit last month called Love to Love You which "gathers art work that takes fan culture as a cue to examine not only the specifics of how we express affection for people far removed from us, but also what that means beyond the exact relationship between audience and creator." The exhibit focuses primarily on music and sports fandoms. "Elissa Goldstone creates objects where there is some resemblance to merchandise or objects that circulate in fan culture, but because of the handmade quality of it, it really has very emotive aspects. It also has a performative aspect, because she sits and watches games and keeps scorecards and then embroiders them, so it's fan identity as performance that then gets transferred to an object."
• While stories such as a fan's walk-on role in "The Office" finale tend to get press for linking fans to creators, places such as The Keysmash blog have been celebrating fandom stories for their personal aspects. In one post a mother realized that fandom could be her community in many ways. "Folks were open and welcoming. I met other women with special needs children and we could talk out our problems and delight in our kids. I met women who had battled depression and anxiety too and I learned from them. I met writers who encouraged me to follow my passion for it. I met women who were not afraid to write and talk about kinks. I met artists who just blew my mind with their talent and creativity. I met runners and fitness gurus who helped me run two 5Ks...I met people from all over the world with different lives and different experiences and different knowledge and I basked in it and shared what I could with them...I am the healthiest I have ever been in mind, body, and spirit and it is all because a prince and a sorcerer couldn’t stop eye-fucking each other."
• The SplitSider focused on fandom's effects on a larger scale by discussing The Arrested Development Documentary Project just as Netflix resurrected the series. The film "flips between interviews with...creator Mitch Hurwitz, seven of the nine regulars, and the show’s producers- and thoughts from die-hard fans of the show. Featuring interviews with passionate Arrested Development fans is a great idea. After all, it's the fans that kept the show alive, making it the cult hit it is today. Unfortunately, this technique doesn’t entirely work. For one thing, the fans [are] never identified—it’s a string of anonymous faces and a brief cameo from Keith Olbermann. And all the enthusiasm in the world doesn’t necessarily make someone an eloquent orator, able to clearly articulate the brilliance of the series."
• Fan eloquence can shine in individual posts, however, utilizing more than just words. One post among the Month of Meta's offerings on Dreamwidth discusses fan expression on Tumblr and why "feels" have come to be. "The term is, far from being a corruption of the language, an elegantly precise word that serves a very useful function. So next time you feel reluctant to say something 'hit you right in the feels' or to cry out 'ow, my feels!' embrace your inner fan, let go of your inner grammarian, and go for it!"

What tributes to fandom have struck a chord with you? Write about it in Fanlore! Contributions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, podcast, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent OTW Fannews post. Links are welcome in all languages! Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

• After Ellen focused on femslash shipping. "The term femslash can be applied to really any female romantic/sexual pairing between characters, even OTPs, but its original purpose was as a reference to alternative lesbian romances based on subtext. Crackships, which is frankly just fun to say, are pairings that are very unlikely to ever occur. In a nutshell, it comes down to the difference between subtext and pure, fun fantasy."
• Meanwhile Neon Tommy talked about fan relationships when they gather into fandoms. "In spite of the differences, petty feuds, ship wars, emotional turmoil and cyclical upheaval, fandoms exist to fulfill the desire for a community of peers and equals who share similar passions. But like a man, no fandom is an island." Instead they grow, shrink, merge and cross over. "Tenuous connections between families are created—"Firefly" and "The Avengers" are connected through Joss Whedon; actors and writers and directors cross over and expand the fandoms, bringing in new ideas and new points of view. New fans should not be excluded; rather, it should be the opposite. New fans keep the fandom's population up; but also, it prevents stagnation." And always important to keep in mind: "Even if your fandom isn't as well-known or visible as another, it's still fantastic, and, more importantly, it's yours."
• Conversely Leverage actress Gina Bellman wrote in The Guardian about a fandom family from the celebrity side. "By seasons four and five, there was a constant flow of tweets, videos and photos posted from the set, trailers, writers' room, costume fittings and even the catering tent. Nowhere was out of bounds. We would gather in the studio to view the fan videos, made in homage to favourite characters or story lines. Hundreds, maybe even thousands of Leverage fan vids are posted on YouTube, some of them expertly edited little treasures in their own right and receiving up to 40,000 hits...At some point, we started referring to fans by their names and avatars."
• Instead of using the family metaphor, The Atlantic chose religion when discussing sports fandom. "Durkheim, a pioneering sociologist, began digging through accounts of 'primitive' cultures like the Arunta tribe of Australia, hoping to excavate the ancient source of ties that bind. His conclusion—as revealed in The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life—remains as profound and relevant today as it is elegantly simple: Whenever a society (or, here, sports subculture) worships a divine form, it is, in fact, also simultaneously worshipping itself." Fandom objects are totems and "totems, while 'officially' symbolizing deities, also implicitly offer vessels for fellowship; licenses to congregate together." An article released the same day on Deadspin showed how Facebook data could provide an NFL fandom map.

What femslash, OTP, shipping, ship war, or Jossverse story do you have to share? Write about it in Fanlore! Contributions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, podcast, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent OTW Fannews post. Links are welcome in all languages! Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

• One of the most discussed problems in fandom recently has been the "fake nerd girl" meme and it's not just women who are getting fed up about it. In the past month a number of male columnists have taken to task fellow fans about their negative behavior, whether through outright condemnation, by teaching-through-sarcasm, or simply trying to change the options a woman has. In a recent post one columnist noted "My sister and I, despite both being very geeky, are very different in how we approach it. Both of us love Horror, Disney, and roleplaying. However she is not a comic book fan and I am not into fanfiction...Now a gatekeeper is going to say that she is wrong. She needs to appreciate the Avengers for its appeal to the comic fans and that legacy and enjoying stories about Tony and Steve adopting Peter Parker is wrong and should be shunned." He closes with a particularly incisive reminder about how this behavior is fostered by the very industries people are fans of, by featuring a copy of a prominent ad in a Batman issue which depicted a female fan as one of the "Greatest Villains of Nerd Culture."
• At SB Nation Cliff Corcoran wrote about a different way in which being too close to the industry of one's fandom can be a negative thing. "Along the way...[m]y Yankee fandom began to fade. The reasons for this were diverse...but they include [f]amiliarity breeds contempt...They say if you love something set it free. I went the opposite route and smothered it until it stopped breathing." In addition, "Would I feel different if the move to the new stadium hadn't cost me my bleacher ticket package? Would I feel different if I had been shown more respect by the team in my capacity as a blogger? Would I feel different if I hadn't heard horror stories from peers who worked for the team in non-media capacities? It's hard to say, but those things certainly helped to tip the balance."
• Gatekeeping behavior isn't just performed by the industry or copied from it however. While politics can be the playground for some people's fandom, in The Daily Dot, Aja Romano wrote about how "[t]he touchiest subject in fandom isn’t about creepy pairings, odd kinks, or terribly written erotica. It’s politics." She cited several points of contention beginning with "a LiveJournal community called Wizards for Bush. The community, which is still active, had only a small number of supporters, but even so, some members of fandom, astonished to find members of their communities joining the group, unleashed anger and mockery upon those who did so. “For those Americans in fandom who follow a different political leaning than liberal-democratic,” wrote sidewinder in a post about the incident on Fanhistory, “Fandom can become a rather unfriendly place for the months leading up to the actual election, as the common assumption seems to become ‘you’re either with us politically, or you’re not one of us at all.’”

If you have stories about gatekeeping in fandom, why not share them on Fanlore? Contributions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, podcast, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent OTW Fannews post. Links are welcome in all languages! Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

• Vulture recently did a long feature on fans and fandoms which included rating "devoted" fandoms, profiling particularly active fans from major fandoms, and a few other fandom-related stories which focused largely on obsessive fan behavior. A number of fans took issue with the conclusions reached, while other publications such as Slate echoed many fans' complaints about poorly defined fannish behavior. "[I]n my experience, intense fandom often leads to a spike in creativity, as anyone who has perused the costumes people make for comic book conventions can tell you. Repeatedly in this article, fandom is flagged as an obstacle for living your life and developing your relationships with others."
• A good counterexample of "fandom as a life obstacle" comes from an Illinois State feature on one of its grads who got his dream job thanks to fandom. "Chicago Cubs fans are a passionate, loyal bunch, and they all have their own story about how they became a fan. For Brad Nagel ’07, it was his grandparents, die-hard fans who never missed a game." Nagel now gets to be the team's fandom liaison. "Nagel pitched some ideas for bridging what he thought was disconnect between the Cubs’ front office and its loyal fans. The Cubs called him in 2009 and brought him on board as a full-time customer relations coordinator, capturing fan feedback through emails, calls and letters. When the Ricketts family bought the team toward the end of 2009, one of their first initiatives was the creation of a Fan Experiences Department, where Nagel eventually landed."
• The Cubs are not alone. On the entertainment industry side, creators, networks and studios want to better understand fans and how to market to them. "'One of the things we have developed here at ITV is a needs-based model looking at how and why people get engaged with certain programmes away from the linear broadcast, and what’s driving that behaviour - whether it’s buying a magazine or looking at websites. This really helps identify the [communications] opportunities for us,' says Watson. 'Tactically, we’re looking at identifying the big opportunities for creating, converting and engaging with fans - helping us direct communications strategies.'"
• Media outlets are also seeing the personal connection as the best point of focus. The Nieman Journalism Lab recently featured a piece on gaming site Polygon and how they plan to set themselves apart as video game journalists. "Justin McElroy, Polygon’s managing editor, said they wanted to take an approach to video game coverage that wasn’t as product-centric — which is difficult since games are items which are bought and sold. McElroy said their challenge is to think bigger, to find unexpected stories about people who make games and people who love games. 'With our features especially, we have an opportunity to change the story and make it about people,' he said. 'People are infinitely more interesting than products and brands.'"

If you're a gaming fan, a sports fan, or have your own story about how fandom put you ahead in life, why not write about it in Fanlore? Contributions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, podcast, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent OTW Fannews post. Links are welcome in all languages! Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.