Abstract
Cultural studies scholars have long been interested in the nexus between people’s online activities and their identities. One activity that has drawn attention is reading/writing fan fiction (fictions written by and for fans that build upon the characters and worlds depicted in commercial texts). While fan fiction and its surrounding communities have long been understood as resistant to heteronormativity, previous work exploring the fans who produce and consume fan fiction has largely insisted that most of these fans are adult ciswomen. Little has been written about the experiences of trans and genderqueer fans. To remedy this elision, this article explores two trans and genderqueer individuals’ experiences with fan fiction. It closely examines the roles reading, and especially reading fan fiction, has or has not played in their understandings of themselves, their identities, and their places in the world.
Highlights
Fan cultures encourage participants “to think critically. . .and to make thoughtful and critical judgements about hegemonic culture” (Booth 2015, ¶ 1.1), including about how “identities are formed, subject positions made available, [and] social agency enacted” (Giroux 2004, 32)
While fan scholars have argued that the mainstreaming of fan cultures has rapidly diversified fan fiction communities (Click and Scott 2018; Hellekson and Busse 2006), binarized conceptions of gender still dominate discussions of fan cultures and behaviors
For Beren, speculative fiction played a key role in providing imaginative horizons for their developing gender identity: Fantasy and sci-fi have offered me more insight into my gender identity than queer theory and gender studies. . .It takes a radical break with the assumptions and constraints of reality. . .to think past the limits of gender and sexuality that make life so dreary
Summary
Fan cultures encourage participants “to think critically. . .and to make thoughtful and critical judgements about hegemonic culture” (Booth 2015, ¶ 1.1), including about how “identities are formed, subject positions made available, [and] social agency enacted” (Giroux 2004, 32). Simon 1988, 11), scholars of fandom have long been concerned with questions of “identity and representational politics” (Click and Scott 2018, 4). A particular focus of fan scholars has been fan fiction—fan-authored texts which expand or reinvent worlds and characters from popular texts—and its surrounding digital communities. Fan fiction creates opportunities for the ongoing lack of diverse commercially published texts (Tyner 2018) to be undermined and provides a critical pedagogical space in which marginalized fans can create their own “mirrors,” see through “windows,” or step through “sliding glass doors” (Bishop 1990) to engage with ways of identifying elided elsewhere. Work examining fan fiction focused almost exclusively on female fans (Click and Scott 2018; Jenkins 2018). While fan scholars have argued that the mainstreaming of fan cultures has rapidly diversified fan fiction communities (Click and Scott 2018; Hellekson and Busse 2006), binarized conceptions of gender still dominate discussions of fan cultures and behaviors. Evidence suggests that genderqueer and trans populations are increasingly present in digital fandom (centreoftheselights 2014; Duggan 2020; McInroy and Craig 2018), they remain underrepresented in research
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
