revdorothyl | Fandom paradigm shift?

Recently (okay, it was just an hour ago on AIM), I made this offhand comment to a friend who'd had help from another fan friend in improving her website, "It's good to have friends in all corners of fandom." Her response was: "I suppose. Lots of those corners are like boxing rings right now, with the Spuffy people arguing with the slash fans. It's very silly."

For some reason, her characterization of the current state of BtVS fandom online made me think of that old standard of graduate education and corporate retreats, Thomas Kuhn's THE STRUCTURE OF SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTIONS. Being tired and somewhat over-full of spanakopitas from my evening's entertainment (killer Scrabble with a fellow grad student), I started to prate along the following lines, and afterward decided that my friend might be right in suggesting that there was some method to my madness. Here's the gist, so that you, dear friend and reader, can make up your own minds about the method/madness question:

"That silly arguing sounds like what precedes a paradigm shift, if Kuhn is to be believed -- everybody gets busy arguing about the rules and trying to slice the pies a little thinner, draw the boundary lines a little tighter. Maybe Buffy Fandom is in for a paradigm shift, a la Quantum physics, any day now? It seems as though the big questions (redemption, meaning of life, something to sing about, nature of love and vocation, etc.) aren't being asked and answered much right now, because we're on the verge of coming up with a new way to look at things. '...And the world ain't comin' to an end, my friend; the world's just comin' to a start...'

"Maybe that's what's happening, really. Or maybe, if we say it, it will become fact -- this being a quantum mechanics universe in which observation affects what's observed, and all."

While I'm waiting with great hopefulness to see what the new season of "Angel" (with Spike!) brings tomorrow night, I'm going to hold on to my paradigm shift idea as long as I can. I mean, I can't believe that all the creative energy and forward momentum of BtVS fandom has dried up or reached a dead-end with the ending of the show. All that good, creative, life-giving energy has to have something up its sleeve, something that's about to be born. 'I feel it in my heart: the world is comin' to a start.'

['...' lyrics quoted from the musical "Purlie"]

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Remember "The X-files"? Remember after the episode "Pusher" and when Scully approaches Mulder in the hospital the little finger cuddle she gives him? Remember how excited everyone got after that? Remember how there was like a gazillion "They go home and get it on!" fics born immediately after that? It is just like that. Exactly. Mulder and Scully for a few brief glorius years (we won't talk about later) *were* a slash couple.

I cry, because I have no idea what you're talking about. I barely remember that episode (guy w/ a tumor doing psychic things to kill people, right?), and when I watched most of my years of the XF, I was not knowledgable about the titles of episodes. I was about 14, and didn't care.

But I can equate to the squeally sentiment. I did a lot of squealing for shippiness, and a lot of inferring and reading between the lines (sometimes I was practically reading between the letters.)

The M/S finger cuddle was a lot like Wes feeding Angel his blood. Except wait! That was much more intense. Wes slit his arm with a knife and fed himself to Angel. But to the fans it was all the same. We see a connection and we see love and some of us also see Ass-Domination.

And what about themes of friendship, idol-worship (probably not the case with W/A), or brotherhood (sister too)? Aren't those strong interpretations too? Or does reading into slash not necessarily contradict all those other themes.

Anyway, those are just general rhetorical thoughts. Like I said, I'm canon-illiterate about this show right now (except for the really big things that I figured out from reading Buffy fic, and watching about 1/3 of the episodes last season), so my arguements are kinda going nowhere.

And what about themes of friendship, idol-worship (probably not the case with W/A), or brotherhood (sister too)? Aren't those strong interpretations too? Or does reading into slash not necessarily contradict all those other themes.

Oh Idol Worship is absolutely the case with W/A - it was the basis of season one. And while prefering a slash pairing does not require these things to be present in the absolute canon (as in preferring a noncanon, though het pairing) - in order to seduce me they need to be there in an abundance. I will not live and breathe and hurt for a pairing unless I believe there is a deep connection. So it is not all about Wes dominating Angel's ass - although there is fun to be had there as well - but how did they get to the point - where they are now in season 5 and Wes is so obviously dominating his ass - what brought them there.

If you are interested in reading an excellent essay about Wesley, Angel, canon, subtext and stereotypes - please check out this post:
http://www.livejournal.com/users/thebratqueen/195009.html

Oh Idol Worship is absolutely the case with W/A - it was the basis of season one.

Ah, I was thinking in terms of season 4. I really need these things to start rerunning on FX or something!

AtS is now in reruns on TNT.

oh, when did this start?! Damn it, I need to pay more attention, now that I'm going to be an AtS fangirl and all.

TNT started Monday-Friday showings of season 1 of AtS a week ago (Sept. 29), so today at 4 PM Central (5 PM Eastern) they'll be up to episode 1.06. However, at least in my area, the local WB station has just recently started Sunday night (10 PM Central) re-runs of season 1, so you can still catch episode 1.03 ("In the Dark" -- the Spike/Gem of Amara crossover episode) this Sunday, Oct. 12, if you have a WB affiliate.

Hm, they're just starting then. Thanks!

Fandom paradigm shift?

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