"The Fandom Chooses the Fan"

I am a nerd, loud and proud. If you could see my house you would not contest it - ceiling to floor with collectibles, merch and everything between of my multitude of favourite fandoms. I am also the president of my university’s fandom society, which I also subsequently started. So yes, I’m a nerd.

I suppose I should start with explaining what fandom is about, though if you’ve found this post you probably already know. On the off-chance you don’t I’m about to explain its going to get technical so just bear with me for a moment.

The dictionary defines ‘Fandom’ as the “the state or condition of being a fan of something, regarded collectively as a community or subculture”, but we all know it’s much deeper than that. Being a part of a fandom is, for many of us, being part of a family.

Everyone is a fan of something. Whether it’s a sport you watch religiously, a band you listen to on repeat, a chef who makes your favourite recipes, or a show you couldn’t live without. Everyone is a fan of something. And these things mean different things to each of us. I’m not a massive fan of sport, that’s not a lie, but I would binge watch Supernatural or Glee on repeat until the day I died. These shows, and many many more as you will find out, mean a lot to me. Being a part of these fandoms means a lot to me. I’m so interested in what fandom means to everyone, to different people and for different reasons.

If you have stumbled across this post then you’re going to hear a lot about what fandom means to me, at least to start with.

So let’s start at the beginning.

When I was four years old my mum read me Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, or the Sorcerer's Stone if you’re listening in America. From that moment on I learned what it meant to fall so far and so hard into a fictional world that it consumes your every thought. I would go to school and redraw my timetable as Hogwarts lessons; science became potions, PE became flying lessons and so on. I had a trunk that I would use instead of a suitcase if I ever went on holiday much to the chagrin of the friend with whom I often stayed. Over the next few years I would collect anything and everything I could get my hands on to do with Harry Potter and the magical world surrounding it. I wrote stories of characters I made up, not knowing at the time what I was doing was classed as fanfiction. I would play imaginary games and talk to the characters as if they were my friends… I was a kid. And since Harry Potter stepped into my life and taught me what it means to be a fan of something so much that it consumes your soul like a horcrux… I haven’t looked back.

It's the choices we make Harry, far more than our abilities.

The first thing I remember being so enthralled with when my mum told me the story of Harry and his adventures was the magic of it all. I loved the fact the glass just disappeared in the zoo - I had been to a zoo, I too had wished the animals would talk to me, and here was a snake talking to this boy. This was 1998, the book had been out a year. My mum had read it and then decided to read it to me. I was four years old, and my parents were as far from the Dursley’s as anyone could get, they are really the best parents anyone could ask for. Yet, despite my starkly different upbringing, I could still imagine myself at eleven being visited by this half-giant and told he was taking me away to this magical world. It made it all the better that I have always been a big believer in magic. I was raised pagan, witchcraft is in my blood, and apparently it was also in Harry’s. I also loved that Harry was just ‘an ordinary boy’, and for all J K Rowling’s many, many flaws, she knew how to write in a way that children such as myself would be drawn to. That was what made it so enticing… this could happen to anyone.

It’s the Harry Potter fandom that I will dedicate this post to, and if you’re a fan I don’t have to tell you how special it was. Is. Despite everything that has happened.

The Harry Potter fandom, for all its merit and shortcomings, comes with a whirlwind of opinions both popular and otherwise. Alongside ‘Trekkies’, who I will talk about in future posts, Potterheads are amongst the most contested and most acknowledged of all pop culture, film and media fandoms. The community of fans, mostly of both the books and the movies but often of one or the other, is both a very welcoming and at times unfortunately a very toxic fandom to be a part of. I didn’t know this when I first started reading the books. I was just a fan of the story, and knew all I could at the time of all the plotlines and characters and creatures that graced the pages. I wasn’t aware of, or even wanting to engage with, the extracurricular activities that some fans were taking part in. In fact I seem to remember the first time I was aware that this bigger fandom existed was the launch of the Order of the Phoenix in 2003. The local bookstore, which I think was a Waterstones, was doing a costume competition to celebrate the book launch. I went as Hermione, as when I was 9 with my brown hair and brown eyes I looked much like the Emma Watson portrayal, and at the time she was as cool as it would get for young girls. We dressed my baby brother, who at the time was only about 10 months old, as baby Harry and it was the first time really I ‘cosplayed’ at an actual themed event. (See photo for reference) My mum made my robes from scratch because you couldn’t actually buy them then and we got a grey jumper and school skirt down the market. I still have them somewhere, probably in my wooden trunk. By this time the first two films had been released and Pottermania really had taken a-hold of the country.

For the first few years it was just me and the books. I’ve always had a massive imagination, and I think that’s important in dwelling in this world of fandom. In my mind I went to class with Hermione, ate feasts with Ron and fought the bad guys with Harry. I was happy living in this imaginary world, and then they brought it to the big screen. When the first film was released in 2001 I was seven years old. I remember going to see the film with my whole family: mum, dad, grandad, and sitting in the very centre of the Odeon auditorium amongst them, eager to see these characters come to life. I don’t really remember very much of the actual experience, only that it was the most magical thing I had ever seen. Every character was perfect, just as they had been in the books, and this world that I had been imagining for the last three years was really there in front of my eyes.

At the time I didn’t have many friends into Harry Potter. I didn’t have many friends at all, so my best friend got the world of Harry Potter forced upon her. She probably would have found it anyway, but together we discovered this amazing world. We would play imaginary games outside in our village, following the footsteps of all the kids who would pick up sticks and claim they were wands, would use their scooters as broomsticks (because you could put your foot on it and flick it upwards whilst saying ‘up’) and climb the tree in the park and pretend it was the Whomping Willow. We could recite the first film word for word, we would make our Bratz dolls and Barbies play out all of the adventures, and we would pretend our boring sausages and mash was fancy Hogwarts food. That was the power of this franchise… it was magical from the get go.

As time went on she grew out of it and onto other things, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but I always stayed with Harry and Hogwarts. I had other interests of course, I wouldn’t claim the title super nerd if I didn’t, but as far as I was concerned between the ages of four and twelve Harry Potter was my whole life. It was a phenomenon and I was thrilled to be part of it. Even when I wasn’t hardcore anymore, when I discovered music and boys and had other interests, there was always still some small part of me that read the books over and over and could answer any trivia question on Harry Potter at the drop of a Sorting Hat. I aced a Harry Potter pub quiz once, winning the top prize, and was determined it would be my Mastermind subject. When the franchise grew and merchandise became more popular I bought all the wands and robes, I wore Slytherin pride on my sleeve and my backpack and I contemplated getting a Harry Potter tattoo when I turned eighteen. I had started growing out of it, but...

Those we love never truly leave us.

When I started University I was excited to join the Harry Potter society and celebrate the franchise with like-minded people. That’s really when I discovered the reality of what it meant to be in a fandom as wholly as I had been. The society divided us into Houses and we competed for the House Cup, which we won for Slytherin house and to this day I am determined that it is due to me and my Slytherin friend who aced every week's challenges. In my second year I ran for committee so that I could help others celebrate fandom, and that’s really where I discovered how powerful it can be to plan events that show your nerdy side. In my third year I became President, and that was where I started to become disillusioned.

For many years the word ‘fandom’ has been bounced around with tentative lips. Those who are not in the eye of the storm see these groups of people dressed as characters as lame, saddos with no life who live in their parents basements and troll online forums all day long. That’s partly why I started the Fandom society at uni - to break the stigma.

Being a part of a fandom can be being a part of a family. But sometimes families can fall apart, and unfortunately that is what seemed to happen for many who became estranged from the Harry Potter fandom. It didn’t happen overnight. I didn’t wake up one morning and decided I didn’t like Harry Potter anymore. I must say with a heavy heart and my wand lowered that unfortunately, I’m not really a fan of Harry Potter anymore. Honestly, part of me still cannot let it go despite the toxicity I have experienced as a member of the Potterhead fandom. Somewhere between the toxicity of the shipping in the fandom (I’ll talk about shipping in another post, but essentially it’s the pairing of certain couples either by canon (what is written) or not). The Harry Potter society at my university had a big part to play. During my tenure as president I was the subject of anger and bullying remarks that I began to associate with the fandom itself, and I hated that. But mostly, and most sadly, it is all the controversy surrounding J K Rowling that meant I just kind of fell out of love with it. I grew out of Harry and Hermione and Hogwarts… and it did break my heart to realise it.

Maybe it will be different when I have my own kids and I introduce them to the world and I’ll see it again through their eyes, digging out all of my old books and merchandise.

Maybe it won’t, and that’s okay.

Fandoms come and go, or at least some of them do. I don’t regret the years I spent at Hogwarts battling the Dark Lord against these imaginary friends, I don’t regret all the money and time I have spent on the franchise. It’s a part of me and it always will be, but I have outgrown it and left it behind. It’s a fandom that opened the door to other fandoms. It’s one that I will remember as an old friend.

Then there are those that stick with you forever, and more often than not these are the smaller, lesser known fandoms. And I’ll talk about smaller fandoms in my next post.

After all, to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure.