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hmpf(Déjà vu: I may have posted a very similar entry about half a year ago. Then again, I may only have intended to. Not sure. If I did, I may even have used the same title. I'm having a distinct feeling of déjà vu here. If I did, how unoriginal of me! I promise you this is better, though. *g*)
When I was in Germany, about 10 days ago, I talked to another fan (waves to Imke!) about LJ and forums for a bit. I compared LJ to a kind of medieval court: come, read my important thoughts, worship me! Of course, that is a blatant oversimplification, and a caricature as well. Still, she understood what I meant and agreed completely. We also agreed that forums, boards and mailing lists of the traditional kind offered much fuller opportunities of participation to 'the common fan'.
I found that interesting, because the people who seem to agree with this view seem all to be fen of the outer to medium circles. The people whose fic is not read at all or read rarely, whose websites, if existent, are hardly known, whose LJs, if they have them, are rarely visited. In short, the beggars and lower classes in the economy of attention that is called fandom. It is understandable that they (we) would be more sensitive to the inequalities of our allegedly egalitarian community.
Don't get me wrong here, I'm not bitching about fandom. I love fandom. Even as a beggar in its economy, I am happy and proud to be a part of it, for a multitude of reasons. One of them is that even as a beggar I have lots of chances of participation in it, and even chances of, let's say, rising through the ranks.
Now, that makes me sound as if all I'm looking for in fandom is a kind of status, something which I, perhaps, do not have in Real Life. Actually, I'm not. I may sometimes feel a little bit 'unread' ;-) but on the whole, I'm quite happy with my place in fandom. Having found some good friends in it is much more important to me than any kind of status could be – and in the end, I suppose, seeing oneself reflected in a friendship, i.e. seeing oneself as beeing seen as *worthy* of that friendship, does a lot more for a positive self-image than being held in high esteem by a large group of people who hardly know you.
However, as someone who's been an outsider most of my life, I can't help but observe and think about things like in-groups, group dynamics, high and low status in groups and how it comes to be created, etc. And, like most human beings, I can't help but notice the reactions and non-reactions of others to me, as measuring ourselves that way is coded into our psyche at an early age (there may be exceptions to this rule, but I've yet to find the person who is totally independent of other people's opinions).
In fandom, you can't really speak of in-groups, as there's no overt exclusion of anybody except people who grossly violate the ethics of fandom (e.g. by plagiarising). On the contrary, fandom is overtly and emphatically inclusive, in fact, its inclusiveness is one of the central parts of its self-representation. (That openness and inclusiveness is probably one of the reasons why so many people who have a history of being an outsider gravitate towards fandom.)
Despite that idea (or ideology?) of inclusion, though, there can be no doubt that fandom is socially layered like any other group of people.
I had a discussion about the social workings of fandom with a Big Name Fan from Farscape fandom earlier this year, and she objected to quite a few of my views as well as to the terms I used. One of these was 'status', and I'm using it with reservations here, because it is indeed not quite what I'm trying to convey. However, I do not know what other term I might use, and 'status' gets close enough to serve me as a shorthand for now.
What do I mean by 'status' here? Well, I think everybody who has been active in fandom for a while becomes aware that just as in Real Life, not everybody 'is the same' in terms of influence. There are fen to whom a great deal of attention is paid, and there are those who pass largely unnoticed on the boards, LJs, archive sites etc. While everyone has, theoretically and in practice, the same right to make postings, write and publish stories, and build websites, not everyone's contributions are valued equally.
That is only natural. A great number of people tends to generate a great amount of material, and the people who consume said material have to establish some criteria by which they choose which fics they read, which postings they reply to, and which websites they visit. And certainly the way by which fandom determines which of the products of its culture are more worthy of attention than others, and which producers of said products hence are awarded a higher status, is tendentially very fair. There is rarely anyone valued highly in fandom who is not worthy of being valued so.
However: after a fandom has lived and grown for a few years, a particular 'class' tends to develop - not by anyone's, least of all their own, volition, but simply because it is a natural consequence of the way fandom distributes attention. The more an author, fic, website, LJ gets recommended, the more people know of it. The more people know of it, the more recommend it, etc. A classic positive feedback loop.
This 'intellectual élite' (though no one in fandom would willingly call it an élite, probably, as that is against the view of fandom as an egalitarian alternative community) comes pretty close to Plato's ideal of philosophers ruling the state. Of course, fandom is not 'ruled' in any way – fandom is by definition 'unrulable', it is practiced anarchy; it cannot really be compared to a state of any description. However, the people who end up being the most influential, said 'intellectual élite', are usually those fen who on a regular basis display the most acute intelligence coupled with a high sensitivity to fannish concerns.
In practice, LJ (and other blogging sites and personal blogs) are where that 'élite' becomes most visible. A direct relation can be observed between the number of people reading (and replying to) your entries, their respective 'status', and your own, in fandom. Not every 'high status fan' is blogging, but most are, and I would actually argue that blogging has increased the trend for the creation of 'élites' in fandom, due to the court-like quality of blogs that I described above. And that quality is something that I really dislike about blogging, and LJ. (And yet I have an LJ myself... hmmm...)
Whew. Okay, I think I'll take off my thinking cap now. Actually, I'd like to discuss this further with other fen who have done some thinking on this, but since few of those read my blog, I'll probably just be talking to myself again here. Not that I *really* mind. Actually, I don't need an audience to ramble endlessly about things like this. That's why I'm studying Cultural Anthropology. *g*
When I was in Germany, about 10 days ago, I talked to another fan (waves to Imke!) about LJ and forums for a bit. I compared LJ to a kind of medieval court: come, read my important thoughts, worship me! Of course, that is a blatant oversimplification, and a caricature as well. Still, she understood what I meant and agreed completely. We also agreed that forums, boards and mailing lists of the traditional kind offered much fuller opportunities of participation to 'the common fan'.
I found that interesting, because the people who seem to agree with this view seem all to be fen of the outer to medium circles. The people whose fic is not read at all or read rarely, whose websites, if existent, are hardly known, whose LJs, if they have them, are rarely visited. In short, the beggars and lower classes in the economy of attention that is called fandom. It is understandable that they (we) would be more sensitive to the inequalities of our allegedly egalitarian community.
Don't get me wrong here, I'm not bitching about fandom. I love fandom. Even as a beggar in its economy, I am happy and proud to be a part of it, for a multitude of reasons. One of them is that even as a beggar I have lots of chances of participation in it, and even chances of, let's say, rising through the ranks.
Now, that makes me sound as if all I'm looking for in fandom is a kind of status, something which I, perhaps, do not have in Real Life. Actually, I'm not. I may sometimes feel a little bit 'unread' ;-) but on the whole, I'm quite happy with my place in fandom. Having found some good friends in it is much more important to me than any kind of status could be – and in the end, I suppose, seeing oneself reflected in a friendship, i.e. seeing oneself as beeing seen as *worthy* of that friendship, does a lot more for a positive self-image than being held in high esteem by a large group of people who hardly know you.
However, as someone who's been an outsider most of my life, I can't help but observe and think about things like in-groups, group dynamics, high and low status in groups and how it comes to be created, etc. And, like most human beings, I can't help but notice the reactions and non-reactions of others to me, as measuring ourselves that way is coded into our psyche at an early age (there may be exceptions to this rule, but I've yet to find the person who is totally independent of other people's opinions).
In fandom, you can't really speak of in-groups, as there's no overt exclusion of anybody except people who grossly violate the ethics of fandom (e.g. by plagiarising). On the contrary, fandom is overtly and emphatically inclusive, in fact, its inclusiveness is one of the central parts of its self-representation. (That openness and inclusiveness is probably one of the reasons why so many people who have a history of being an outsider gravitate towards fandom.)
Despite that idea (or ideology?) of inclusion, though, there can be no doubt that fandom is socially layered like any other group of people.
I had a discussion about the social workings of fandom with a Big Name Fan from Farscape fandom earlier this year, and she objected to quite a few of my views as well as to the terms I used. One of these was 'status', and I'm using it with reservations here, because it is indeed not quite what I'm trying to convey. However, I do not know what other term I might use, and 'status' gets close enough to serve me as a shorthand for now.
What do I mean by 'status' here? Well, I think everybody who has been active in fandom for a while becomes aware that just as in Real Life, not everybody 'is the same' in terms of influence. There are fen to whom a great deal of attention is paid, and there are those who pass largely unnoticed on the boards, LJs, archive sites etc. While everyone has, theoretically and in practice, the same right to make postings, write and publish stories, and build websites, not everyone's contributions are valued equally.
That is only natural. A great number of people tends to generate a great amount of material, and the people who consume said material have to establish some criteria by which they choose which fics they read, which postings they reply to, and which websites they visit. And certainly the way by which fandom determines which of the products of its culture are more worthy of attention than others, and which producers of said products hence are awarded a higher status, is tendentially very fair. There is rarely anyone valued highly in fandom who is not worthy of being valued so.
However: after a fandom has lived and grown for a few years, a particular 'class' tends to develop - not by anyone's, least of all their own, volition, but simply because it is a natural consequence of the way fandom distributes attention. The more an author, fic, website, LJ gets recommended, the more people know of it. The more people know of it, the more recommend it, etc. A classic positive feedback loop.
This 'intellectual élite' (though no one in fandom would willingly call it an élite, probably, as that is against the view of fandom as an egalitarian alternative community) comes pretty close to Plato's ideal of philosophers ruling the state. Of course, fandom is not 'ruled' in any way – fandom is by definition 'unrulable', it is practiced anarchy; it cannot really be compared to a state of any description. However, the people who end up being the most influential, said 'intellectual élite', are usually those fen who on a regular basis display the most acute intelligence coupled with a high sensitivity to fannish concerns.
In practice, LJ (and other blogging sites and personal blogs) are where that 'élite' becomes most visible. A direct relation can be observed between the number of people reading (and replying to) your entries, their respective 'status', and your own, in fandom. Not every 'high status fan' is blogging, but most are, and I would actually argue that blogging has increased the trend for the creation of 'élites' in fandom, due to the court-like quality of blogs that I described above. And that quality is something that I really dislike about blogging, and LJ. (And yet I have an LJ myself... hmmm...)
Whew. Okay, I think I'll take off my thinking cap now. Actually, I'd like to discuss this further with other fen who have done some thinking on this, but since few of those read my blog, I'll probably just be talking to myself again here. Not that I *really* mind. Actually, I don't need an audience to ramble endlessly about things like this. That's why I'm studying Cultural Anthropology. *g*
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no subject
Date: 2003-11-07 04:19 pm (UTC)What I've noticed on the LJs of the BNFs (and others too) is that even though everyone's free to leave comments, that's not really an equalising factor in practice. Some comments get more attention than others, usually (admittedly not exlcusively, so you're sometimes right) the ones by friends (friends friends, not just friendslist friends) of the BNF. (Evidence for attention being responses to that note, and threads developing). This favouritism (not in a bad sense) in a potentially very equal setting actually perpetuates and strengthens the hierarchy. People may stop lurking by making a contribution to discussion, but if that contribution's not picked up on and discussed then it's a somewhat insignificant move from lurkerdom in the general context, if not to the lurker themselves.
no subject
Date: 2003-11-07 06:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-11-07 08:45 pm (UTC)It may be in part quality (i.e., when I see a brilliant comment I want to see who that person is, and I've friended quite a few people that way) or it is simply familiarity...while i don't know you (i.e., I don't think we've ever directly interacted), I've seen your name around...have seen your comments in other people's journals, have seen people reference your posts, etc. And the opposite might be true as well, right? That means for one, of course, that we have intersecting flists but, more importantly, that we both comment a lot. So, while quantity doesn't necessarily do it, it might be a participating factor. If nothing else, it gets your name out there and while that might simply create an annoying buzz to some people *g*, others might get curious.
Bottom line, though, is that yes, it is about friendships (why shouldn't it be...I like to talk to people like myself, that have common interests, to people that are interesting to me) but it is also about performance...and that can occur any number of ways...and commenting and interacting with people is part of that.
Agreed.
Date: 2003-11-11 06:43 pm (UTC)One of the most galling things to me, in the beginnings of my life in fandom, was not being able to contribute due to outer factors, like lack of money (an online minute cost me 3 cent then, flat rates did not exist yet), lack of a computer (for my first half year or so in fandom, I depended on my parents' computer, which I could use for about 3 hours a week), and lack of time (that is still a major factor for me, whereas the former to aren't, anymore). Given those factors, I'm sure you can imagine I never really contributed much to my first fandom! The annoying thing is of course that people online don't know if you're not contributing because you can't think of anything worthwhile to say, are shy, or due to aforementioned outside factors.
The most galling thing for me, however, is simply lack of intellectual capacity. To judge myself lacking *that* is hard to bear for me, becaus I have always seen my value as a person as largely determined by how bright I am. I think that is really at the bottom of my 'status' issue. It's really a kind of 'But I want to be a genius, too, Mom!' thing. I'm not sure if that is an issue for anybody but myself, but if it is, I think it may be the most difficult issue here, since it is not possible to overcome it. You can't be brighter than you are.
Is there any doubt that fandom is a valuable case study?
Date: 2003-11-11 06:31 pm (UTC)I agree about the friends thing. It's not surprising or wrong or anything - in fact, it's just the normal way humans behave, and if I were a BNF with dozens of replies to each of my postings, hell, I'd decide in exactly the same way which replies I'd reply to and which not. Who wouldn't?
But you're right in that it *does* strengthen the 'hierarchy' (thought it's not really stable enough to be called a hierarchy, I think) - because the people who aren't BNF see who gets the most replies to their replies etc., and - because that is *also* typical of the way we humans behave - translate it into a sign of those people's higher status.