9 - A Donut for Tom Paris: Identity and Belonging at European SF/Fantasy Conventions

Summary

Decades ago, fans were usually adults who had the economic and social liberty of going to conventions or clubs. Recently, the discourse on fandom has become entwined with that on new media audiences, who are not only portrayed as younger, but also seen as especially exemplary of fandom in terms of their online activity. As a result of the increase in online participatory culture, criticism has followed suit, often focusing more on the “online” than the “offline” dimensions of fandom. However, concerts, conventions, movie theaters, and fan clubs remain relevant sites where media fandom is performed today, and these venues are especially revealing for the study of both cult and sf, one of the media genres in which cult texts have most flourished. In fact, only offline, amongst those who embody the enthusiasm of cult activity, can the scholar witness the key role that intimacy plays in enabling and characterizing the typical cult audience and cult relationship.

Academic commentary has often defined cult texts in relation to their media fandom and the intense and critical commitment of their audiences (Mathijs and Sexton 17–18). These definitions of cult reception echo the social and affective patterns that are often mentioned as characteristics of fandom (see Grossberg; Fiske, Understanding; Jenkins, Textual Poachers). Of course, differentiating between the fan and the cultist is problematic, since both are adoring, active audiences, but two differences are especially noteworthy here. First, while fandom of movies and television series is historically grounded and organized, for instance through early fan magazines and clubs, cult largely emerged in the 1970s and ties viewers to a critical discourse and a vintage identity of that era (Mathijs and Sexton 3). Cult fans invest in specialized media texts and knowledge (Abercrombie and Longhurst 138–39), and by defining their tastes as oppositional from the mainstream, they maintain a sense of distinction (Mathijs and Mendik 2). Second, academic studies on fanship have differentiated fans from other audiences through their productivity (see Fiske's “Cultural Economy”). In their creative fan practices, fans rework, extend, and appropriate popular culture through creative writing, costumes, fan art, and other activities (Jenkins, Textual Poachers). While cultists are recognizable through their knowledge practices, media fans seek to deepen the text through transformation.