Author: Anne Kustritz
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1003830005
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 332
Book Description
This book explores slash fan fiction communities during the pivotal years of the late 1990s and early 2000s as the practice transitioned from print to digital circulation. Delving into over ten years of online and in-person ethnography, the book offers an in-depth examination of slash fan fiction – original stories written by and circulated within female-centered communities about same-sex characters borrowed from previously published sources – to document the history of a feminist, queer media subculture whose infrastructure, creativity, and ways of life are often obscured in dominant histories of the internet’s development and by the contemporary focus on industry-friendly but often misogynist digital fan subcultures. Arguing that online slash communities created an alternate public space that provided opportunities for unanticipated encounters with a wide range of complex sexual, relational, and political practices, the book contends that slash thereby added to readers’ tools for experiencing and thinking about pleasure and ways of living by forming a “pocket public,” that is a digital space public enough to be found and protected enough to shield participants from harassment and censorship. This insightful and comprehensive study will interest students and scholars working in the areas of media studies, literary studies, anthropology, new media, audience communities, convergence culture, fan studies, women’s studies, and queer studies.
Identity, Community, and Sexuality in Slash Fan Fiction
Author: Anne Kustritz
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1003830005
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 332
Book Description
This book explores slash fan fiction communities during the pivotal years of the late 1990s and early 2000s as the practice transitioned from print to digital circulation. Delving into over ten years of online and in-person ethnography, the book offers an in-depth examination of slash fan fiction – original stories written by and circulated within female-centered communities about same-sex characters borrowed from previously published sources – to document the history of a feminist, queer media subculture whose infrastructure, creativity, and ways of life are often obscured in dominant histories of the internet’s development and by the contemporary focus on industry-friendly but often misogynist digital fan subcultures. Arguing that online slash communities created an alternate public space that provided opportunities for unanticipated encounters with a wide range of complex sexual, relational, and political practices, the book contends that slash thereby added to readers’ tools for experiencing and thinking about pleasure and ways of living by forming a “pocket public,” that is a digital space public enough to be found and protected enough to shield participants from harassment and censorship. This insightful and comprehensive study will interest students and scholars working in the areas of media studies, literary studies, anthropology, new media, audience communities, convergence culture, fan studies, women’s studies, and queer studies.
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1003830005
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 332
Book Description
This book explores slash fan fiction communities during the pivotal years of the late 1990s and early 2000s as the practice transitioned from print to digital circulation. Delving into over ten years of online and in-person ethnography, the book offers an in-depth examination of slash fan fiction – original stories written by and circulated within female-centered communities about same-sex characters borrowed from previously published sources – to document the history of a feminist, queer media subculture whose infrastructure, creativity, and ways of life are often obscured in dominant histories of the internet’s development and by the contemporary focus on industry-friendly but often misogynist digital fan subcultures. Arguing that online slash communities created an alternate public space that provided opportunities for unanticipated encounters with a wide range of complex sexual, relational, and political practices, the book contends that slash thereby added to readers’ tools for experiencing and thinking about pleasure and ways of living by forming a “pocket public,” that is a digital space public enough to be found and protected enough to shield participants from harassment and censorship. This insightful and comprehensive study will interest students and scholars working in the areas of media studies, literary studies, anthropology, new media, audience communities, convergence culture, fan studies, women’s studies, and queer studies.
Just Wonder
Author: Pauline Greenhill
Publisher: University Press of Colorado
ISBN: 1646425855
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 243
Book Description
Inspired by folklore, television, fairy tales, social media, novels, and films, Just Wonder addresses crucial themes in social and ecological justice efforts. Moving into the mid-twenty-first century, wonder—as a potentially critical sociocultural, ecological, and individual stance—will play a significant role in reconceptualizing the present to imagine a different and better world. These essays examine fairy tales and other traditional forms of the fantastic and the real to offer alternative expressions of justice relevant to gender, sex, sexuality, environment, Indigeneity, class, ability, race, decolonizing, and human and nonhuman relations. By analyzing fairy tales and wonder texts from various media through an intersectional feminist lens, Pauline Greenhill and Jennifer Orme consider how wonder genres and forms blend with diverse conceptions of seeking and enacting justice. International collaborators—both established and emerging scholars who self-identify with different subjectivities, locations, and generations and come from an impressive range of inter/disciplines—engage with contemporary and historical texts from various languages and cultural contexts, including interventions, counterparts, and comparisons to the fairy tale. Just Wonder offers a critical look at how creative wondering can expand the ability to resist modes of oppression while fostering equity, as well as encourage curiosity and imagination. In a world that can be overwhelming and precarious, this book presents scholarly, artistic, personal, and collective-action interventions to identify and respond to injustice while centering wonder and, thus, imagination, questioning, and hope. Just Wonder will appeal to fairy-tale scholars; folklorists; students and scholars of film, media studies, and cultural studies; as well as a general audience.
Publisher: University Press of Colorado
ISBN: 1646425855
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 243
Book Description
Inspired by folklore, television, fairy tales, social media, novels, and films, Just Wonder addresses crucial themes in social and ecological justice efforts. Moving into the mid-twenty-first century, wonder—as a potentially critical sociocultural, ecological, and individual stance—will play a significant role in reconceptualizing the present to imagine a different and better world. These essays examine fairy tales and other traditional forms of the fantastic and the real to offer alternative expressions of justice relevant to gender, sex, sexuality, environment, Indigeneity, class, ability, race, decolonizing, and human and nonhuman relations. By analyzing fairy tales and wonder texts from various media through an intersectional feminist lens, Pauline Greenhill and Jennifer Orme consider how wonder genres and forms blend with diverse conceptions of seeking and enacting justice. International collaborators—both established and emerging scholars who self-identify with different subjectivities, locations, and generations and come from an impressive range of inter/disciplines—engage with contemporary and historical texts from various languages and cultural contexts, including interventions, counterparts, and comparisons to the fairy tale. Just Wonder offers a critical look at how creative wondering can expand the ability to resist modes of oppression while fostering equity, as well as encourage curiosity and imagination. In a world that can be overwhelming and precarious, this book presents scholarly, artistic, personal, and collective-action interventions to identify and respond to injustice while centering wonder and, thus, imagination, questioning, and hope. Just Wonder will appeal to fairy-tale scholars; folklorists; students and scholars of film, media studies, and cultural studies; as well as a general audience.
Identity, Community, and Sexuality in Slash Fan Fiction
Author: Anne Kustritz
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781003450030
Category : Fan fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
"This book explores slash fan fiction communities during the pivotal years of the late 1990s and early 2000s as the practice transitioned from print to digital circulation. Delving into over ten years of online and in-person ethnography, the book offers an in-depth examination of slash fan fiction - original stories written by and circulated within female-centered communities about same-sex characters borrowed from previously published sources - to document the history of a feminist, queer media subculture whose infrastructure, creativity, and ways of life are often obscured in dominant histories of the internet's development and by the contemporary focus on industry-friendly but often misogynist digital fan subcultures. Arguing that online slash communities created an alternate public space that provided opportunities for unanticipated encounters with a wide range of complex sexual, relational, and political practices, the book contends that slash thereby added to readers' tools for experiencing and thinking about pleasure and ways of living by forming a "pocket public," that is a digital space public enough to be found and protected enough to shield participants from harassment and censorship. This insightful and comprehensive study will interest students and scholars working in the areas of media studies, literary studies, anthropology, new media, audience communities, convergence culture, fan studies, women's studies, and queer studies"--
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781003450030
Category : Fan fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
"This book explores slash fan fiction communities during the pivotal years of the late 1990s and early 2000s as the practice transitioned from print to digital circulation. Delving into over ten years of online and in-person ethnography, the book offers an in-depth examination of slash fan fiction - original stories written by and circulated within female-centered communities about same-sex characters borrowed from previously published sources - to document the history of a feminist, queer media subculture whose infrastructure, creativity, and ways of life are often obscured in dominant histories of the internet's development and by the contemporary focus on industry-friendly but often misogynist digital fan subcultures. Arguing that online slash communities created an alternate public space that provided opportunities for unanticipated encounters with a wide range of complex sexual, relational, and political practices, the book contends that slash thereby added to readers' tools for experiencing and thinking about pleasure and ways of living by forming a "pocket public," that is a digital space public enough to be found and protected enough to shield participants from harassment and censorship. This insightful and comprehensive study will interest students and scholars working in the areas of media studies, literary studies, anthropology, new media, audience communities, convergence culture, fan studies, women's studies, and queer studies"--
Fan Podcasts
Author: Anne Korfmacher
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1040087159
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 216
Book Description
Starting from the observation of the ubiquity of fan podcasts engaging in media commentary, this book explores three fan podcast genres in which commentary manifests as a structuring form: rewatch and reread podcasts, recap podcasts, and review podcasts. The author conducts a formalist genre analysis of these podcasts, close reading nine case studies to describe how the three genres function and how different fan labour manifests in podcasting. Each case study teases out the themes, style, and formal constellations of the three podcast genres, shows how different fans activate the affordances of podcasting and commentary, and reveals the distinct generic functions of the three podcast genres. This book will be of significant interest to scholars and students in podcast studies, fan studies, cultural studies and literary studies who are interested in fan podcasts, podcast genre analysis, and ways of close reading podcasts as texts.
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1040087159
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 216
Book Description
Starting from the observation of the ubiquity of fan podcasts engaging in media commentary, this book explores three fan podcast genres in which commentary manifests as a structuring form: rewatch and reread podcasts, recap podcasts, and review podcasts. The author conducts a formalist genre analysis of these podcasts, close reading nine case studies to describe how the three genres function and how different fan labour manifests in podcasting. Each case study teases out the themes, style, and formal constellations of the three podcast genres, shows how different fans activate the affordances of podcasting and commentary, and reveals the distinct generic functions of the three podcast genres. This book will be of significant interest to scholars and students in podcast studies, fan studies, cultural studies and literary studies who are interested in fan podcasts, podcast genre analysis, and ways of close reading podcasts as texts.
Framing Fan Fiction
Author: Kristina Busse
Publisher: University of Iowa Press
ISBN: 1609385152
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 263
Book Description
Gathering some of Kristina Busse’s essential essays on fan fiction together with new work, Framing Fan Fiction argues that understanding media fandom requires combining literary theory with cultural studies because fan artifacts are both artistic works and cultural documents. Drawing examples from a multitude of fan communities and texts, Busse frames fan fiction in three key ways: as individual and collective erotic engagement; as a shared interpretive practice in which tropes constitute shared creative markers and illustrate the complexity of fan creations; and as a point of contention around which community conflicts over ethics play out. Moving between close readings of individual texts and fannish tropes on the one hand, and the highly intertextual embeddedness of these communal creations on the other, the book demonstrates that fan fiction is simultaneously a literary and a social practice. Framing Fan Fiction deploys personal history and the interpretations of specific stories to contextualize fan fiction culture and its particular forms of intertextuality and performativity. In doing so, it highlights the way fans use fan fiction’s reimagining of the source material to explore issues of identities and peformativities, gender and sexualities, within a community of like-minded people. In contrast to the celebration of originality in many other areas of artistic endeavor, fan fiction celebrates repetition, especially the collective creation and circulation of tropes. An essential resource for scholars, Framing Fan Fiction is also an ideal starting point for those new to the study of fan fiction and its communities of writers.
Publisher: University of Iowa Press
ISBN: 1609385152
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 263
Book Description
Gathering some of Kristina Busse’s essential essays on fan fiction together with new work, Framing Fan Fiction argues that understanding media fandom requires combining literary theory with cultural studies because fan artifacts are both artistic works and cultural documents. Drawing examples from a multitude of fan communities and texts, Busse frames fan fiction in three key ways: as individual and collective erotic engagement; as a shared interpretive practice in which tropes constitute shared creative markers and illustrate the complexity of fan creations; and as a point of contention around which community conflicts over ethics play out. Moving between close readings of individual texts and fannish tropes on the one hand, and the highly intertextual embeddedness of these communal creations on the other, the book demonstrates that fan fiction is simultaneously a literary and a social practice. Framing Fan Fiction deploys personal history and the interpretations of specific stories to contextualize fan fiction culture and its particular forms of intertextuality and performativity. In doing so, it highlights the way fans use fan fiction’s reimagining of the source material to explore issues of identities and peformativities, gender and sexualities, within a community of like-minded people. In contrast to the celebration of originality in many other areas of artistic endeavor, fan fiction celebrates repetition, especially the collective creation and circulation of tropes. An essential resource for scholars, Framing Fan Fiction is also an ideal starting point for those new to the study of fan fiction and its communities of writers.
Fan Fiction and Fan Communities in the Age of the Internet
Author: Kristina Busse
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786454962
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 296
Book Description
Fans have been responding to literary works since the days of Homer's Odyssey and Euripedes' Medea. More recently, a number of science fiction, fantasy, media, and game works have found devoted fan followings. The advent of the Internet has brought these groups from relatively limited, face-to-face enterprises to easily accessible global communities, within which fan texts proliferate and are widely read and even more widely commented upon. New interactions between readers and writers of fan texts are possible in these new virtual communities. From Star Trek to Harry Potter, the essays in this volume explore the world of fan fiction--its purposes, how it is created, how the fan experiences it. Grouped by subject matter, essays cover topics such as genre intersection, sexual relationships between characters, character construction through narrative, and the role of the beta reader in online communities. The work also discusses the terminology used by creators of fan artifacts and comments on the effects of technological advancements on fan communities. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786454962
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 296
Book Description
Fans have been responding to literary works since the days of Homer's Odyssey and Euripedes' Medea. More recently, a number of science fiction, fantasy, media, and game works have found devoted fan followings. The advent of the Internet has brought these groups from relatively limited, face-to-face enterprises to easily accessible global communities, within which fan texts proliferate and are widely read and even more widely commented upon. New interactions between readers and writers of fan texts are possible in these new virtual communities. From Star Trek to Harry Potter, the essays in this volume explore the world of fan fiction--its purposes, how it is created, how the fan experiences it. Grouped by subject matter, essays cover topics such as genre intersection, sexual relationships between characters, character construction through narrative, and the role of the beta reader in online communities. The work also discusses the terminology used by creators of fan artifacts and comments on the effects of technological advancements on fan communities. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.
Fic
Author: Anne Jamison
Publisher: BenBella Books, Inc.
ISBN: 1939529204
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 304
Book Description
What is fanfiction, and what is it not? Why does fanfiction matter? And what makes it so important to the future of literature? Fic is a groundbreaking exploration of the history and culture of fan writing and what it means for the way we think about reading, writing, and authorship. It's a story about literature, community, and technology—about what stories are being told, who's telling them, how, and why. With provocative discussions from both professional and fan writers, on subjects from Star Trek to The X-Files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer to Harry Potter, Twilight, and beyond, Fic sheds light on the widely misunderstood world(s) of fanfiction—not only how fanfiction is transforming the literary landscape, but how it already has. Fic features a foreword by Lev Grossman (author of The Magicians) and interviews with Jonathan Lethem, Doug Wright, Eurydice (Vivean Dean), and Katie Forsythe/wordstrings. Cyndy Aleo (algonquinrt; d0tpark3r) V. Arrow (aimmyarrowshigh) Tish Beaty (his_tweet) Brad Bell Amber Benson Peter Berg (Homfrog) Kristina Busse Rachel Caine Francesca Coppa Randi Flanagan (BellaFlan) Jolie Fontenot Wendy C. Fries (Atlin Merrick) Ron Hogan Bethan Jones Christina Lauren (Christina Hobbs/tby789 and Lauren Billings/LolaShoes) Jacqueline Lichtenberg Rukmini Pande and Samira Nadkarni Chris Rankin Tiffany Reisz Andrew Shaffer Andy Sawyer Heidi Tandy (Heidi8) Darren Wershler Jules Wilkinson (missyjack) Jen Zern (NautiBitz)
Publisher: BenBella Books, Inc.
ISBN: 1939529204
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 304
Book Description
What is fanfiction, and what is it not? Why does fanfiction matter? And what makes it so important to the future of literature? Fic is a groundbreaking exploration of the history and culture of fan writing and what it means for the way we think about reading, writing, and authorship. It's a story about literature, community, and technology—about what stories are being told, who's telling them, how, and why. With provocative discussions from both professional and fan writers, on subjects from Star Trek to The X-Files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer to Harry Potter, Twilight, and beyond, Fic sheds light on the widely misunderstood world(s) of fanfiction—not only how fanfiction is transforming the literary landscape, but how it already has. Fic features a foreword by Lev Grossman (author of The Magicians) and interviews with Jonathan Lethem, Doug Wright, Eurydice (Vivean Dean), and Katie Forsythe/wordstrings. Cyndy Aleo (algonquinrt; d0tpark3r) V. Arrow (aimmyarrowshigh) Tish Beaty (his_tweet) Brad Bell Amber Benson Peter Berg (Homfrog) Kristina Busse Rachel Caine Francesca Coppa Randi Flanagan (BellaFlan) Jolie Fontenot Wendy C. Fries (Atlin Merrick) Ron Hogan Bethan Jones Christina Lauren (Christina Hobbs/tby789 and Lauren Billings/LolaShoes) Jacqueline Lichtenberg Rukmini Pande and Samira Nadkarni Chris Rankin Tiffany Reisz Andrew Shaffer Andy Sawyer Heidi Tandy (Heidi8) Darren Wershler Jules Wilkinson (missyjack) Jen Zern (NautiBitz)
Gender(ed) Identities
Author: Tricia Clasen
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1317430719
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 316
Book Description
This volume brings together diverse, cross-disciplinary scholarly voices to examine gender construction in children's and young adult literature. It complements and updates the scholarship in the field by creating a rich, cohesive examination of core questions around gender and sexuality in classic and contemporary texts. By providing an expansive treatment of gender and sexuality across genres, eras, and national literature, the collection explores how readers encounter unorthodox as well as traditional notions of gender. It begins with essays exploring how children's and YA literature construct communities formed by gender, ethnicity, sexuality, and in face-to-face and virtual spaces. Section II's central focus is how gendered identities are formed, unpacking how texts for young readers ranging from Amish youth periodicals to the blockbuster Divergent series trace, reproduce, and shape gendered identity socialization. In section III, the essential literary function of translating trauma into narrative is addressed in classics like Anne of Green Gables and Pollyanna, as well as more recent works. Section IV's focus on sexuality and romance encompasses fiction and nonfiction works, examining how children's and young adult literature can serve as a regressive, progressive, and transgressive site for construction meaning about sex and romance. Last, Section IV offers new readings of paratextual features in literature for children -- from the classic tale of Cinderella to contemporary illustrated novels. The key achievement of this volume is providing an updated range of multidisciplinary and methodologically diverse analyses of critically and commercially successful texts, contributing to the scholarship on children's and YA literature; gender, sexuality, and women's studies; and a range of other disciplines.
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1317430719
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 316
Book Description
This volume brings together diverse, cross-disciplinary scholarly voices to examine gender construction in children's and young adult literature. It complements and updates the scholarship in the field by creating a rich, cohesive examination of core questions around gender and sexuality in classic and contemporary texts. By providing an expansive treatment of gender and sexuality across genres, eras, and national literature, the collection explores how readers encounter unorthodox as well as traditional notions of gender. It begins with essays exploring how children's and YA literature construct communities formed by gender, ethnicity, sexuality, and in face-to-face and virtual spaces. Section II's central focus is how gendered identities are formed, unpacking how texts for young readers ranging from Amish youth periodicals to the blockbuster Divergent series trace, reproduce, and shape gendered identity socialization. In section III, the essential literary function of translating trauma into narrative is addressed in classics like Anne of Green Gables and Pollyanna, as well as more recent works. Section IV's focus on sexuality and romance encompasses fiction and nonfiction works, examining how children's and young adult literature can serve as a regressive, progressive, and transgressive site for construction meaning about sex and romance. Last, Section IV offers new readings of paratextual features in literature for children -- from the classic tale of Cinderella to contemporary illustrated novels. The key achievement of this volume is providing an updated range of multidisciplinary and methodologically diverse analyses of critically and commercially successful texts, contributing to the scholarship on children's and YA literature; gender, sexuality, and women's studies; and a range of other disciplines.
Electronic Tribes
Author: Tyrone L. Adams
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 0292784473
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 333
Book Description
Whether people want to play games and download music, engage in social networking and professional collaboration, or view pornography and incite terror, the Internet provides myriad opportunities for people who share common interests to find each other. The contributors to this book argue that these self-selected online groups are best understood as tribes, with many of the same ramifications, both positive and negative, that tribalism has in the non-cyber world. In Electronic Tribes, the authors of sixteen competitively selected essays provide an up-to-the-minute look at the social uses and occasional abuses of online communication in the new media era. They explore many current Internet subcultures, including MySpace.com, craftster.org, massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) such as World of Warcraft, music downloading, white supremacist and other counterculture groups, and Nigerian e-mail scams. Their research raises compelling questions and some remarkable answers about the real-life social consequences of participating in electronic tribes. Collectively, the contributors to this book capture a profound shift in the way people connect, as communities formed by geographical proximity are giving way to communities—both online and offline—formed around ideas.
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 0292784473
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 333
Book Description
Whether people want to play games and download music, engage in social networking and professional collaboration, or view pornography and incite terror, the Internet provides myriad opportunities for people who share common interests to find each other. The contributors to this book argue that these self-selected online groups are best understood as tribes, with many of the same ramifications, both positive and negative, that tribalism has in the non-cyber world. In Electronic Tribes, the authors of sixteen competitively selected essays provide an up-to-the-minute look at the social uses and occasional abuses of online communication in the new media era. They explore many current Internet subcultures, including MySpace.com, craftster.org, massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) such as World of Warcraft, music downloading, white supremacist and other counterculture groups, and Nigerian e-mail scams. Their research raises compelling questions and some remarkable answers about the real-life social consequences of participating in electronic tribes. Collectively, the contributors to this book capture a profound shift in the way people connect, as communities formed by geographical proximity are giving way to communities—both online and offline—formed around ideas.
The Ashgate Research Companion to Fan Cultures
Author: Linda Duits
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317043472
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 502
Book Description
Fans constitute a very special kind of audience. They have been marginalized, ridiculed and stigmatized, yet at the same time they seem to represent the vanguard of new relationships with and within the media. ’Participatory culture’ has become the new normative standard. Concepts derived from early fan studies, such as transmedial storytelling and co-creation, are now the standard fare of journalism and marketing text books alike. Indeed, usage of the word fan has become ubiquitous. The Ashgate Research Companion to Fan Cultures problematizes this exaltation of fans and offers a comprehensive examination of the current state of the field. Bringing together the latest international research, it explores the conceptualization of ’the fan’ and the significance of relationships between fans and producers, with particular attention to the intersection between online spaces and offline places. The twenty-two chapters of this volume elucidate the key themes of the fan studies vernacular. As the contributing authors draw from recent empirical work around the globe, the book provides fresh insights and innovative angles on the latest developments within fan cultures, both online and offline. Because the volume is specifically set up as companion for researchers, the chapters include recommendations for the further study of fan cultures. As such, it represents an essential reference volume for researchers and scholars in the fields of cultural and media studies, communication, cultural geography and the sociology of culture.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317043472
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 502
Book Description
Fans constitute a very special kind of audience. They have been marginalized, ridiculed and stigmatized, yet at the same time they seem to represent the vanguard of new relationships with and within the media. ’Participatory culture’ has become the new normative standard. Concepts derived from early fan studies, such as transmedial storytelling and co-creation, are now the standard fare of journalism and marketing text books alike. Indeed, usage of the word fan has become ubiquitous. The Ashgate Research Companion to Fan Cultures problematizes this exaltation of fans and offers a comprehensive examination of the current state of the field. Bringing together the latest international research, it explores the conceptualization of ’the fan’ and the significance of relationships between fans and producers, with particular attention to the intersection between online spaces and offline places. The twenty-two chapters of this volume elucidate the key themes of the fan studies vernacular. As the contributing authors draw from recent empirical work around the globe, the book provides fresh insights and innovative angles on the latest developments within fan cultures, both online and offline. Because the volume is specifically set up as companion for researchers, the chapters include recommendations for the further study of fan cultures. As such, it represents an essential reference volume for researchers and scholars in the fields of cultural and media studies, communication, cultural geography and the sociology of culture.