#iggextraordinaire | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

amosanguis · 12 years ago

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For those tagged.

Tumblr: The Children of Fandom

Tumblr, at its most basic, is a social networking website. Created in February 2007 by David Karp, there are now more than 78.5 million blogs and 34.3 billion posts (www.tumblr.com/about). Throughout the years, not only has the look of Tumblr changed (pages 10-14), but also the content. Not long after its creation, it was not just photography and fashion blogs that existed here, but fandoms. What is a fandom? The word itself is a mash-up of “fanatic domain.” Anything can have a fandom; from TV shows and movies, bands and books; even a few actors are popular enough to have their own fandoms. I will only be discussing four of the main fandoms: Supernatural, Doctor Who, Sherlock, and The Avengers. First I will go into the jargon of Tumblr, then the four main fandoms, fanworks, how Tumblrites view other social networking sites, the overall attitude of a Tumblrite, and lastly, I will tell you about how Tumblr saved the life a young woman named Sashi. To many young men and women around the world Tumblr isn’t just a website – it is a haven, it is the last place to go.

So to begin to understand what Tumblr is, the language of a Tumblrite must be understood. Some of the most popular words are “fandom”, “feels” (Pheels, to the Avengers), “asdfghjkl;”, “ship”, “slash”, and “canon”. I’ve already discussed “fandom”; however another point to be brought up is that some fandoms have a specific name for themselves. Example, members of the Doctor Who fandom are known as Whovians. Now, the word feels, means an onslaught of emotions. To the Avengers fandom, “Pheels” is a mash up of “feels” and “Phil” and is used when discussing any feeling about Phil Coulson. “Asdfghjkl;” is the keyboard smash and is a way to express extreme emotion; other ways to do this are to use I can’t, what is air, nope, dead, ugh. “Ship” is a word that comes from the word “relationship” and is used to describe the pairing of two characters in a romantic relationship. A male/female ship is known as a “het” ship, between two males it is called “slash” (taken because of the “/” between names with the first ever “slash pairing” being Kirk/Spock from Star Trek: the original series), and between two females, “femslash.” Often, the names of the two characters will be mashed to form a ship name. For example, the slash ship of Dean and Castiel is known as Destiel. “Canon” (not cannon), is the actual timeline of the movie, TV show, novel, etc. Other forms of this are “fanon” (any event accepted among fans without being actual canon) and “headcanon” (fanon that varies from fan to fan). Now, it is time to take this vocabulary and move on into the fandoms themselves.

Among the oldest and largest of all fandoms are the Whovians, the Doctor Who fandom. It is one of the shows that is considered a prerequisite for joining Tumblr – at least, if you want to understand a lot of the inside jokes made by other Tumblrites. Whovians also have a habit of ruining “hipster” posts. Also, due to the nature of the main character, the Doctor, and his adventures, there are many crossovers that occur in their fanworks. A crossover is when a fanwork – such as fanfiction, fanvideos, and fanart, which will be discussed later – includes two or more fandoms.

The Supernatural fandom is broken into many sub-fandoms based on a fan’s favorite character/actor. The three biggest sub-fandoms are the Moosekateers, fans of Jared Padalecki who plays Sam Winchester (Sam was once called a moose by one of the villains because of his 6’5” stature); Misha Collins, playing Castiel, dubbed his Twitter followers “minions”; fans of Mark Pellegrino, who plays Lucifer, are called Lucifer’s Legion. At times, there are wars between sub-fandom (this kind of behavior is known as “fandom wank”); this usually takes place on various message boards and normally doesn’t last very long. The normal reason for a fandom wank is during a prolonged hiatus between seasons or episodes. On October 3rd, Supernatural returned for its eighth season. Now, in the days before the season premiere, the fandom was abuzz with theories, set pictures, and spoilers for the upcoming episodes. Now, after the episode aired, all of Tumblr was about Supernatural as users blogged about the episode and how they felt about what happened. The sense of togetherness after being apart for such a long time really resounded in a lot of the posts.

Next there is the Sherlock fandom, also known as “The Fandom That Waited” due to the two year hiatus between seasons one and two, and the one year hiatus between seasons two and three. It should also be mentioned that each season only had three 90 minute episodes. For this reason, many Sherlockians are held to be the craziest of all fandoms. Many of their gifs are extremely silly and used to help pass the time during their hiatuses. Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays the titular character Sherlock, has a large fandom who calls themselves “Cumberbabes.”

The fourth and final main fandom of Tumblr is The Avengers. This fandom is primarily made of fans that have only seen the movie, though there are a few diehard fans who have been reading the comics for a very long time. There are two main sub-fandoms for The Avengers; the fans of Tom Hiddleston, (who plays Loki) called Hiddlestoners, and those who have accepted the Super Family fanon. Many Hiddlestoners have proclaimed Tom Hiddleston as the King of Tumblr. This is because his interviews show that he loves the characters he plays just as much, if not more, than many Tumblrites. In the Super Family fanon, Steve Rodgers and Tony Stark are married (taken from the comic Dark Reign: Fantastic Four #2 in which Tony was born as Natasha Stark and was romantically involved with Steve Rodgers, eventually marrying him; this alternate world is known as Earth-3490) and have adopted Peter Parker (portrayed by Andrew Garfield from The Amazing Spider-Man). Much of this AU (alternate universe) centers on a teenage Peter Parker and his secret relationship with Deadpool (this ship is known as Spideypool). A lot of this fanon comes from panels in the original comics (Peter looking up to Steve and Tony as father-figures; Deadpool having a strong interest in Peter) and the fans take what is canon and run with it..

Now, as I mentioned earlier, some fanworks will contain more than one fandom – this is called a crossover. And some fans have taken the four fandoms just described, mashed the names, and created a whole new fandom called Superwhovengerlock (also spelled Superwhoavengerlock, Superwhovengerslock). Here is a link to a fan made trailer for this crossover: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZKgFqW0eBg). Another popular crossover is with only three of four fandoms, called Superwholock. This leads me into my next topic: fanworks.

In order to contribute to their fandoms, many fans will write fanfiction, draw and paint fanart, and/or create fanvids. “Fanfiction” is a story about the characters and is separate from the canon story line. Fanfiction may cover “missing scenes” from an episode or movie that the author felt was neglected by the show’s or movie’s script – these are called tags. Fanart is just as it sounds; a drawing or painting uploaded and posted. The trailer for Superwhovengerlock is an example of a fanvid. Under fanvids, is another popular aspect of Tumblr: a gif. A gif is a file format that stands for “Graphic Interchange Format” and it is a soundless 1 to 10 second video. An example can be found here: http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lzqan5dTvD1qk553k.gif. If an author or artist is good at what they do, they will soon gather a few fans of their own.

Now, Tumblr has an interesting relationship with the social networking sites Facebook and Twitter. Many Tumblrites view it as a taboo to sync Tumblr with Facebook. The main rule to follow is that a user may post from Facebook, but may not post from Tumblr onto Facebook. Now, with Twitter, screencaps of celebrity tweets may be posted. It is frowned upon for a user to sync their Twitter and Tumblr; however, it is not as taboo as posting on Facebook. The reason for this is that many Tumblrites are unhappy or too socially awkward and Tumblr is the place where they can come and just be themselves without having to worry about being judged. When asked about how Tumblr has affected her life, Aline, a Tumblrite, said: “I’m not depressed anymore because I know there are other people like me, who like the same things, people I can talk to and I know they don’t judge me : they appreciate me for who I am. I’m also more confident, I’ve started to love myself again.” When asked the same question, greatbritishcheese replied with “Since I became really involved in the Tumblr community, I’ve gotten a lot more confident about myself- my body, my skills, my personality. I feel like no matter where I go, I have an amazing support system. I have people to be happy for me when good things happen, and console me when they take a turn for the worse.” These interview excerpts lead into the next topic: the overall attitude of a Tumblrite.

“Yes, Tumblr has influenced me a lot actually because I feel that I am actually more open minded than I was before,” says thecrimson-dynamo, “and that I am less often judging people.” This is something that resonated through all of the interviews – many users have found that Tumblr has changed them for the better and taught them about the outside world. Iggextraordinaire says, “I love Tumblr as a consistent stream of information and also a great way to socialize with other people, so that basically means I’m on Tumblr several hours a day. The biggest effect is probably the self-confidence and camaraderie that I’ve found.” Unfortunately, Tumblr is still the internet. Solebonds talks about her negative experience: “Well I’ve been in debates where neither side has conceded or compromised. I have been in some fandom wars that have been the epitome of childishness. Probably the only truly negative experience though has been when people have used the site to rally hate and have targeted it at individuals. It’s total cyber bullying. Probably one of the most positive experiences however is when you get the whole fandom community getting together and spreading love to try and counter this.” Kirstenlovesherspikebot and greatbritishcheese both shared their negative experiences of receiving hate mail. “But the thing about getting hate mail on Tumblr is that as soon as you post it, you have eight billion people sticking up for you. So really, it ends up being a really positive experience as well,” says greatbritishcheese. While I may seem biased and only telling the good of Tumblr while down-playing the bad, that is just not the case. Tumblr really is just this happy place, this little haven. And to further that point, it is time to talk about Sashi.

Sashi is a 24-year-old woman who has been living with Endometriosis, cysts that grow around her ovaries. Her case was so severe, the cysts growing up to 8 cm, that it was affecting her intestines and several other internal organs and she was forced to quit working (thus losing her medical insurance). In late January, one of Sashi’s Tumblr friends posted a video asking for a little help to save Sashi’s life, to help her get the surgery that would remove the cysts. The video spread like wildfire throughout all of Tumblr as the message of Sashi and her plight was tagged through multiple fandoms. In just five hours, over a thousand dollars had been donated. Within 24 hours, over $11,000 had been raised and, from Sashi’s home fandom: Supernatural, cast members Mark Sheppard, Sebastian Rochè, Richard Speight Jr., and Julie McNiven tweeted their support. And then Kim Rhodes, another cast member from Supernatural, tweeted: “please get me her info. I had the same situation, I have a surgeon who will help her in CA. He will work with her on $.” With all of the star power behind her, it was not long before the original goal of $30,000 was met. And then it was exceeded. Since then, Sashi has been through multiple surgeries and has had one of her ovaries completely removed.

In conclusion, to some of the hidden youth of the world, Tumblr is not just a website – it is a haven, it is the last place to go. It is “the home I always wanted and the family I always needed.” (greatbritishcheese). Each fan takes away something different from its fandom. Whovians and Sherlockians believe that no matter how small and insignificant a person believes themselves to be, they always – always – have an effect on someone. The Supernatural fandom believes that family is the most important thing, no matter what happens, and that no, “Family don’t end with blood.” (Bobby Singer, Supernatural, Season 2, Episode 22 “All Hell Breaks Loose: Part 2”). This was shown plainly in Sashi’s case. The Avengers believe that a person should always go down fighting, they should always stand up for what is right. These lessons from these core fandoms of Tumblr are reiterated time and time again through all of the various fanworks.

Works Cited

Aline. Interview. Kirsten Roberts. September 2012.

greatbritishcheese. Interview. Kirsten. September 2012.

iggextraordinaire. Interview. Kirsten. September 2012.

kirstenlovesherspikebot. Interview. Kirsten. September 2012.

solebonds. Interview. Kirsten. September 2012.

thecrimson-dynamo. Interview. Kirsten. September 2012.

"Bobby Singer, Supernatural, Season 2, Episode 22 “All Hell Breaks Loose: Part 2”." n.d.

Tumblr Jargon

1. Tumblr: a land of rainbows, unicorns, and happy things. A place where everything is okay and is often an escape for those who are bullied, insecure, or lead stressful lives. Tumblr may also lead to sleep deprivation and Nutella cravings. A person who uses Tumblr is most commonly referred to as a Tumblrite.

2. Dashboard: layout of the Tumblr site. Posts from followed blogs appear on the user’s dashboard or “dash”. These posts can be added to the user’s own blog by using the “reblog” option.

3. Liveblogging: when a blogger posts about an event/movie/episode/book as it happens

4. Gifs: a video that last anywhere between 1 to 10 seconds, has no sound and usually subtitled. Can be pronounced as “gifs” or “jiffs”

5. Fandom: a community of people with similar interests. Ex: people who watch Doctor Who are known as the Whovian fandom.

6. Asdfghjkl: a way to express extreme emotion. Examples: I can’t, what is air, nope, dead, ugh

7. Feels: an onslaught of emotions. To the Avengers fandom, “Pheels” is a mash up of “feels” and “Phil” and is to be used when discussing Phil Coulson.

8. “This”, “Accurate”: used in the stead of a long narrative to describe how you are feeling about a statement, photo, or gif.

9. Shipping: the act of supporting/wishing for a romantic relationship between two characters. If male/female, then it is a “het” ship, between two males – “slash”, and between two females – “femslash”. Often the names from the two characters will be mashed to form a ship name. Ex: “Destiel” is the ship name for the two characters Dean and Castiel.

10. Canon: The timeline of a movie, TV show, novel, comic. Fanon is any event that is accepted among fans without being actual canon. Headcanon is normally just a “truth” that fits into fans personal beliefs about a show, movie, novel, comic or any of the characters.

11. Fangirl/fangirling: freaking out over something that is/has/will happen

12. GPOY: “gratuitous picture of yourself”; may also be used to described a picture or gif that accurately describes a user’s feelings.

13. Gifset: if two or more photos are added in a photo post.

#greatbritishcheese #somnifuge #kirstenlovesherspikebot #iggextraordinaire #solebonds #thecrimson-dynamo #thank you bbs for all your help XD

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