Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Shared Narratives: Intermediality in Fandom
- 2 Fan Membership: Traditional and Digital Fieldwork
- 3 Naturalizing Sherlock: Dutch Fans Interpret the Famous Detective
- 4 Queer Teen Drama: Rewriting and Narrative Closure in Glee Fan Fiction
- 5 Transmedia Play: Approaching the Possible Worlds of Firefly
- 6 Embodied Characters: The Affective Process of Cosplay
- 7 Conclusion: Prospects for Fan Studies
- Bibliography of Fan Works
- Index
2 - Fan Membership: Traditional and Digital Fieldwork
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 December 2020
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Shared Narratives: Intermediality in Fandom
- 2 Fan Membership: Traditional and Digital Fieldwork
- 3 Naturalizing Sherlock: Dutch Fans Interpret the Famous Detective
- 4 Queer Teen Drama: Rewriting and Narrative Closure in Glee Fan Fiction
- 5 Transmedia Play: Approaching the Possible Worlds of Firefly
- 6 Embodied Characters: The Affective Process of Cosplay
- 7 Conclusion: Prospects for Fan Studies
- Bibliography of Fan Works
- Index
Summary
Abstract
In the study of participatory cultures, reflection on one's own membership and role within the communities is needed. I propose that mixed-methods research is essential when doing research on fan communities. The combination of different types of qualitative data and close reading is essential. This study is structured as an ethnography – applied in a broad sense as the study of lived cultures – by using relevant methods such as participant observation, insider ethnography, and qualitative interviewing. The role of the researcher as a fan herself is discussed as well. Finally, I advance geek feminism as a methodological stance, one that effectively connects the endeavours of researchers and informants, a scholar and her subjects.
Keywords: Ethnography, participant observation, geek feminism, aca-fandom
Introduction
The study of fans requires a methodological framework that can account for its social, creative, and affective features. My cases address textual and visual consumption as a lived experience and are investigated through methods from both the social sciences and the humanities. This study is interpretive and therefore relies on various qualitative rather than quantitative methods.
My methodology can be summarized in two ways. First, ethnography allowed me to collect information by participating in fandom both online and off-line. In addition, I used both informal and in-depth interview techniques to shed light on what fandom meant to my informants and how they viewed their creative practices. I did, however, also include my own affective experiences of fandom. By incorporating my own voice, I felt that I could better signify what certain creative and playful practices are like and what a source text does to fans.
Second, I have combined these social methods with a medium-specific analysis of the fan texts themselves and their source texts. This combination of narrative analysis and ethnographic methods is innovative and necessary. Important claims have been made to combine close reading with other types of data, such as in-depth interviews (see also Gray, 2003). A good example of this two-fold method is the study by Joke Hermes (2004), who discovered, in her research on detective novels, that fans highlighted specific textual structures that she had interpreted differently (pp. 79-96). My credo is that a scholar's method is related to the type of data that s/he wants to unearth and that one should not be afraid to use inventive methods to provide a valid overview.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Productive FandomIntermediality and Affective Reception in Fan Cultures, pp. 47 - 66Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2018