There's Nothing Only About Being With Girls (or, Is Slashing Sarah Jane an Anti-Feminist Activity?)

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Title:	There's Nothing Only About Being With Girls (or, Is Slashing Sarah Jane an Anti-Feminist Activity?
Creator:	ladyvivien
Date(s):	Jan 21, 2007
Medium:	online
Fandom:	Doctor Who
Topic:	Femslash
External Links:	There's Nothing Only About Being With Girls (or, Is Slashing Sarah Jane an Anti-Feminist Activity?
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There's Nothing Only About Being With Girls (or, Is Slashing Sarah Jane an Anti-Feminist Activity? is an essay by ladyvivien.

It has 57 responses.

Excerpts

With a character like Sarah, I've always been surprised at the lack of f/f fic in which she features. I think in part it's because retroshipping the original series is hard enough when it's Doctor/Sarah or Sarah/Harry, but actually writing femslash featuring one of the more minor characters in specific episodes - the delicously stone-butch Hilda Winters, or the Queen in Monster of Peladon, for example - just never seems to happen.

I see Sarah as an eminently slashable character for multiple reasons, yet I rarely end up writing femslash for her myself. I think that the reasons I'd pair her with a woman feel pretty problematic to me, and I'm wondering if that's the same for other people. It's practically canon that she doesn't date men, but does that automatically follow that she dates women? If it wasn't for her references to the Doctor as the man she never quite got over, I don't think I'd hesitate, but I'm wary about making it sound as though women are just her second choice. As both a lesbian and a feminist, that actually makes me veer towards writing hetfic for Sarah so that I don't have to deal with those questions, or feel like I'm expressing a view that I'd find reprehensible in real life. And the feminism raises another issue - I've read fic in countless fandoms that uses a character's feminism almost as justification for slashing her - partly I feel that it's a cliche and a stereotype, and partly as far as vintage!Sarah goes I can't get away from the fact that '70s feminism was frequently quite hostile towards lesbianism so those two ideas don't link together as well for me.

I think one problem is that there really aren't that many women in Who other than the companions, especially not in the older series. I find some of the audios wonderfully subtexty - the main female character in 'Mirror, Signal, Manoevure' takes Sarah to the Island of Woman or something, and keeps telling her that she's Sarah's biggest fan...I know mariannesquee has written Sarah/Ellie, which I think is interesting, and I think that were it not for the casting implications, Sarah/Nat would be pretty interesting (incidentally, how many of you would find the fact that Lis Sladen's daughter plays a non-related central character a barrier to slashing those two?).

So why isn't there more Sarah femslash? Is it the reasons I mentioned, or because the majority of people here just don't write femslash? And, more importantly, who wants to write me some Sarah/Hilda Winters?

Comments

[hhertzof]: My reason is simple: any same sex pairing I've tried to write that wasn't a drabble has been crap. I may try again someday, but I've given up for now.

My writing has tended to be heavily Doctor/Sarah, which is odd, since I'll read any pairing, male or female, and I've enjoyed most of what I've read, and I doubt if the two of them had a relationship that it would be exclusive - they've spent too much time apart for that to work.

I also think she's probably had relationships in the meanwhile (gender unspecified), either they weren't serious or didn't work out (perhaps due to comparing them to what she had with the Doctor).

[glinda_penguin]: It's rather an interesting issue you've brought up there. I think one of the major issues of retro-shipping is tangled up in this subject. For an awful lot of people companions are people you grew up looking up to/envying. They are fundamental influences of some people's development. Speaking from personal experience I grew up worshipping the ground Sarah Jane walked on. I first watched her aged 7 and spent a good part of the next three years trying to look/act and otherwise be just like her in every possible way. I've always quite consciously avoided writing her because I'm vary aware that it's likely to be wish-fufillment stuff, making her all Mary-Sue rather than Sarah-Jane. When it comes to femme-slash it gets even more complex. Because while I can look back on strong female characters I idolised in my teens as the hero-worship/proto-crush stuff, and be objective and laugh at myself for my denial that actually I really fancied them. But Sarah...

The whole Sarah/Doctor thing can be either really complex or scarily simple. I tend to hark back to the whole 4 refering to her as his best friend thing. Dynamics between a guys best female friend and his girlfriend (or for that matter boyfriend) can be interesting to say the least. There's a lot of different kinds of love and sometimes the problems come when people forget that.

...I just read that back and I'm sure there was a point but I really can't figure out what it was... hope it's useful anyways! :)

[cybertardis]: I think hhertzof nailed it as far as the progression of Sarah romanticizing the Doctor after their time together was over. Though there was some retroshipping, one does not necessarily have to regard Sarah and the Doctor's partnership as sexual or romantic back in the day. You could, but you don't have to. As an old-school who fan (been watching since I was 11 and Sarah/Lis was my first girl!crush ever and the one that has most stood the test of time *grin*) I still struggle with the exploration of sexuality in the new series. I like it, I think it's an interesting and in some ways necessary direction, but I'm still not completely up to speed on it just yet, which gets in the way of the writing. If anything, bringing Sarah in actually helped me deal with that a little better since I was initially completely turned off by the idea of Nine/Rose or Ten/Rose. I was less so after "School Reunion."

I think femslash in Doctor Who suffers from the same problem that a lot of series suffered from and that's lack of good female characters. My sense, though I'd have to look this up, is that Lis was oftentimes the only female cast member on some episodes. Or she shared very little screentime with the other female characters who might be appearing in a given episode. As I think back over the series, I'm coming up with precious little material that you could write while she was with the Doctor, other than what's already been mentioned in the original post.

After she leaves the doctor is another story, because the thought of a Sarah Jane/Lis Shaw story just makes my mouth water! I liked Liz and was sorry she was only around for a season. I've also considered writing Sarah Jane/Tegan as well because if there was ever a character who was desperately in need of post-Doctor healing, it would be Tegan. Sarah Jane might not be the best person for that, but it would make for a wonderful story, IMO. And, if Mrs. Wormwood is a recurring villain on SJA, well, I'm sure that's already in the works somewhere. :D I'd read it.

As to whether it's reasonable to slash Sarah Jane, well, that's never stopped fanfiction writers before. :) But, in this case, I think it is reasonable, assuming you could find the right partner for her. You already have the hook that renders gender meaningless, IMO, which is the whole idea of shared experience. There are a whole host of former female companions out there that she can relate to on many levels, some sexual, some romantic, some platonic, but all meaningful and interesting.

When Sarah Jane was first introduced, her feminism was blatant and a bit over the top, IMO. I think it was necessary to establish the character, and set up some interesting banter and conflict with the Doctor. But, I much preferred it when they softened Sarah a bit, and got away from the more strident feminism notes, to be honest. I, too, hate to see feminism used to justify slashing a female character, but at the same time, a woman can be a feminist and prefer to date women at the same time. :D The two aren't mutually exclusive, so I never really saw any difficulty with that with respect to Sarah Jane. I think she became a much more nurturing character as her time with the Doctor progressed. She still retained her sense of self and her strength, but her harder edges were softened. I think that progression makes her the logical choice to hook up with other companions after the fact, along with the shared experience idea.

So, I think there's lots of post-Doctor fodder for the femslash cannon. During her time with the Doctor...not so much. I'll have to think further on it. You *could* write a Liz Shaw/Sarah Jane story set during either one's time with the Doctor, actually, now that I think of it.