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Geeks, nerds, and fandom love
Apr. 4th, 2013 03:04 pmEpbot has a post Do we need a new word for "geek"?" in response to discussions around a video by Felicia Day in which she says that geeks need to "reclaim" the word.
I think she's right that the meaning of the word has shifted to something more "mainstream", sometimes a label to "describe a person who is defined solely by liking comics or games or movies or TV", making it easier for firms to market for them and seeing them as a group of consumers. Felicia Day: "To me, "geek" means an outsider, a rebel, a dreamer, a creator, whether it's our own world or someone else's. It's a fighter. It's a person who dares to love something that isn't conventional. The mantra of "geek" to me is "your judgement is not my problem.""
There are some interesting comments in and to the Epbot post around the question "how do we remain an open, inclusive community while still retaining a strong sense of identity": label or no label, geeks and nerds and other stuff, geek as noun or verb, the joys of sharing, who gets to call who a geek, but many more questions than answers.
I think it's a bit strange to use "outsider" as a defining quality of a group, because what do you do when "the others" welcome you? And what does it matter if something you love is conventional? Same with "rebel", why do you have to rebel against something? I like the other parts of Felicia's attempt, but not as anything definitive.
Sidenote: I wonder how much people's different definitions depend on how much they experienced exclusion in school for their interests. It seems to be a stereotypical part of the "typical geek growing up experience", which seems a bit sad to me. I never really felt that - I had few friends in school because I was smart and that made me a bit arrogant, and I'm usually good at finding safe spaces to talk about spaceships and pirates and stuff (although every once in a while I slip up and people look at me funny *g*)
I've been called a geek and a nerd, more often in recent times because I have more friends I can talk about spaceships with, and I'm fine with both, but I don't really care. That's not really how I think about myself. "Geeky", sometimes, as an adjective, but not with any strong conviction.
What's much more important to me is that I'm "in fandom." Not only a fan, many people are fans of something, but that I'm part of a community that loves things and enjoys sharing that love with others and creates other things out of that. Sure, you can have the same discussions about who is part of this community. There are many different communities - Lj/Dw are different from Tumblr is different from ff.net is different from messageboards is different from YouTube and Twitter - but they all have these things in common, loving something and sharing it with others and often creating things to celebrate what you love. I know I'm part of that, it makes me happy, and that's enough for me.
Speaking of, coincidentally *g*: the OTW is currently holding its biannual (I think) membership drive. A lot of what I post about volunteering here is negative because I need spaces to vent, but I still really love the OTW and the AO3 and Fanlore and all of its projects. Even with all of its problem I'm very glad the OTW exists, and I'm convinced it's only going to become more amazing going forward.
I think she's right that the meaning of the word has shifted to something more "mainstream", sometimes a label to "describe a person who is defined solely by liking comics or games or movies or TV", making it easier for firms to market for them and seeing them as a group of consumers. Felicia Day: "To me, "geek" means an outsider, a rebel, a dreamer, a creator, whether it's our own world or someone else's. It's a fighter. It's a person who dares to love something that isn't conventional. The mantra of "geek" to me is "your judgement is not my problem.""
There are some interesting comments in and to the Epbot post around the question "how do we remain an open, inclusive community while still retaining a strong sense of identity": label or no label, geeks and nerds and other stuff, geek as noun or verb, the joys of sharing, who gets to call who a geek, but many more questions than answers.
I think it's a bit strange to use "outsider" as a defining quality of a group, because what do you do when "the others" welcome you? And what does it matter if something you love is conventional? Same with "rebel", why do you have to rebel against something? I like the other parts of Felicia's attempt, but not as anything definitive.
Sidenote: I wonder how much people's different definitions depend on how much they experienced exclusion in school for their interests. It seems to be a stereotypical part of the "typical geek growing up experience", which seems a bit sad to me. I never really felt that - I had few friends in school because I was smart and that made me a bit arrogant, and I'm usually good at finding safe spaces to talk about spaceships and pirates and stuff (although every once in a while I slip up and people look at me funny *g*)
I've been called a geek and a nerd, more often in recent times because I have more friends I can talk about spaceships with, and I'm fine with both, but I don't really care. That's not really how I think about myself. "Geeky", sometimes, as an adjective, but not with any strong conviction.
What's much more important to me is that I'm "in fandom." Not only a fan, many people are fans of something, but that I'm part of a community that loves things and enjoys sharing that love with others and creates other things out of that. Sure, you can have the same discussions about who is part of this community. There are many different communities - Lj/Dw are different from Tumblr is different from ff.net is different from messageboards is different from YouTube and Twitter - but they all have these things in common, loving something and sharing it with others and often creating things to celebrate what you love. I know I'm part of that, it makes me happy, and that's enough for me.
Speaking of, coincidentally *g*: the OTW is currently holding its biannual (I think) membership drive. A lot of what I post about volunteering here is negative because I need spaces to vent, but I still really love the OTW and the AO3 and Fanlore and all of its projects. Even with all of its problem I'm very glad the OTW exists, and I'm convinced it's only going to become more amazing going forward.
