From slash to the mainstream: female writers and gender bending men
| Commentary | ||
|---|---|---|
| Title: | From slash to the mainstream: female writers and gender bending men | |
| Commentator: | Elizabeth Woledge (Kent State University Press) | |
| Date(s): | 2005 | |
| Medium: | ||
| Fandom: | Meta, fan fiction | |
| External Links: | link to description is here | |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | ||
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From slash to the mainstream: female writers and gender bending men is by Elizabeth Woledge.
The abstract: "This article discusses fiction written by women, that focuses on male protagonists, representation of whose gender is facilitated by the theme of same sex intimacy. This group of texts forms a clear subset of both mainstream science fiction and fantasy as well as of slash fiction, but by no means accounts for the entire spectrum of any one of these genres."
The fifth chapter, called "The Context of Intimacy: Della Van Hise and Her Interpretive Community," focuses on slash, K/S, slash fans as intimatopic interpreters, and touches upon the works of Mel Keegan and how her professional works compare to her Pros fanfic. Woldege quotes much K/S fanfic from zines and describes her experiences at Kiscon.
Excerpt
Slash fiction, the subset of fan-fiction which eroticises the homosocial bonds depicted between media heroes, has generally been considered as, in Constance Penley's words, a "unique hybrid genre of romance, pornography and utopian Science Fiction" (480). Since Penley's essay of 1992 the slash genre has significantly expanded and now appropriates media sources, which could not be considered science fiction. Nevertheless, it remains true that the original slash fandom, that which appropriated Star Trek's Kirk and Spock, is infused with science fiction elements, and that many science fiction and fantasy sources have proved popular with slash fiction writers who create homoerotic fan fiction from sources as diverse as Lord of the Rings, Highlander, The X-Files, Buffy and Harry Potter. It is also the case that science fiction and fantasy elements, perhaps imported from other fandoms, find their way into slash fiction which is not based upon a science fiction or fantasy source. For instance, in the case of Bodie and Doyle from The Professionals slash writers such as Anne Carr and Helen Raven have, respectively, created fantasy and science fiction backdrops for their appropriative fictions. Clearly, despite its diversification much slash fiction does retain an element of fantasy and science fiction (though not always a utopian one), as much as it continues to contain both romantic and pornographic elements. Thus, although three of Penley's original assertions continue to hold true, the first of her assumptions, that of the "unique" nature of slash fiction needs, I believe, to be re-addressed.
