I'm going to Bristol!

[rm]

I've been making a lot of noise about Bristol, but today I can finally say my abstract has been accepted to the conference, Desiring the Text, Touching the Past: Towards An Erotics of Reception.

A Tangible Reality of Absence: Fan Communities and the Mourning of
Fictional Characters

Audiences, particularly those segments that self-identify as fans,
often respond strongly to the deaths of beloved characters in the
narratives of popular television, film, and book series. In some
cases, these audiences react to fictional deaths by engaging in
traditional mourning rituals, including memorial ceremonies and
displays, charity tribute funds, and personal presentation
modification.

Through these acts, audience members stake claim to otherwise
inaccessible desired bodies while also creating a dialogue that
eroticizes the deceased. These displays of desire also serve to claim
status within fan communities: after all, mourners are traditionally
not just lovers, but also friends, colleagues, and family members.
Thus, the mourning activities of the fan community become an act of
partial defictionalization, moving the desired bodies of personal and
narrative fantasy into a tangible reality of absence.

Not all fictional deaths, however, elicit such reactions. Rather,
whether audience-led mourning rituals occur is dictated by narrative
context, including the degree to which death is fetishized in the
source material and the accessibility of the character's flesh in the
canonical story.

By highlighting fan responses to the deaths of Ianto Jones from
"Torchwood," Hoban Washburne from "Firefly," and Severus Snape from
the "Harry Potter" series and comparing these responses to historical
incidences of mourning for literary characters, this paper seeks to
address the phenomenon of non-fictional mourning for fictional
characters and examine the narrative features that provoke these acts
of eroticization, which are often perceived as transgressive by those
outside of the participating communities.

That I'm getting to do this means a lot to me. Mourning as a lens through which to view the world, fictional and not, is this weird thing that's always been intrinsic to my nature. When this CFP came up right around the same time I was being utterly taken with/touched/fascinated by the Mermaid Quay display for Ianto Jones, this thing just sprung into my head, and all the preliminary research I did made it just stronger and more specific and fascinating and weird than anything I could have imagined.

To get to do something like this as an independent scholar without an advanced degree (I'm on a panel with three professors and my paper is paired with something related to Augustine (and thank god, I have more of a background in that than I should)) is huge. To get to do something like this about stuff I love, (and about characters I've mourned; 2009 has been a weird year) and at a conference that notes (in a manner that implicitly smacks down the notion than fannishness is weakness or sin) in the CFP that "many classical and medieval authors recount embodied and highly emotional encounters with religious, fictional or historical characters," is something I don't even really know how to emotionally react to yet.

But I wanted this like mad, and now have a lot of hard work ahead of me. This is the beginning of something awesome and something I deserve, and oh shit, now this means I'm going to England twice next year!

Some of you may be hearing from me with some requests for favors, or warning that I want to cite one of your fics (actually, I think there's just one of you I have to email about that). I also have to begin the great death fetishization re-watch/re-read of all this stuff (mmmm, science-y). Meanwhile, and this isn't even a joke -- this shit is fraught for me for I hope obvious reasons -- what do I wear?

Comments

[schpahky.livejournal.com]

DUDE AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME!!!

[rm.livejournal.com]

I am really excited and a bit intimidated.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

OMG! YAY!

*hugs you* and *cheers*

I remember when you posted about CFP... it's like an acknowledgement of some kind.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I love that sentence in the CFP SO MUCH.

Man, I am so stupidly excited about this (and sort of terrified. I'm starting to have that "I bet I'm the only person without an advanced degree" feeling.

[redstapler.livejournal.com]

OH MAZEL TOV!!!!

This is spectacular. Best news of the year, so far as I can say. :)

Congratulations.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Well, 2009 has admittedly sucked, but thank you! You have more info than most about why I felt like I _needed_ this one to happen. And here it is.

[britgeekgrrl.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's amazing!

When will you be there? I've a couple of pals in Bristol that I was thinking about seeing during my trip in March...

[rm.livejournal.com]

The conference is July 10, and beyond that I haven't really thought it through, although probably not for very long, since Patty and I will be doing a week in London (and a possible weekend in Dublin) in April for a conference she has a paper in.

[51stcenturyfox.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! That's great news! :)

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[ladyofthelog.livejournal.com]

Yaaaaaaaaaaaay! Congrats!

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[haste.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! Holy shit, that's awesome.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[tsarina.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! I am so excited for you! This is really just amazing and fascinating.

Clotheswise, I vote for the Snape coat. But that's the wizard talking.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that would be no. I will not be wearing my brick-colored shirt or the pinstripe suit either. Jesus.

And thank you! Holy fuck, this thing.

[newsbean.livejournal.com]

Mazel tov!


I just did a little fist pump for you.

AWESOME.

[rm.livejournal.com]

AWESOME.

Thank you!

[logospilgrim.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! And enjoy yourself, eh? It will no doubt be a fascinating presentation :-)

[rm.livejournal.com]

I will certainly try! Thank you. I may section out the Snape-focused part for something at Infinitus, because there's definite differences between incidences of fan mourning for his death as, say, Sirius's.

[dr-is-in.livejournal.com]

Congratulations!

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[rm.livejournal.com]

Mostly, the first issue, is always "what gender presentation shall I go with and what does that say about me and my authority". This was particularly fraught when I did the Snape & female heroism paper, because ANYTHING I wore could be used to cross-examine my motives as opposed to my research/analysis. This is less fraught, but I'm still conscious of it.

(and thank you!)

[dremiel.livejournal.com]

Mazel Tov! This is fantastic news.

[rm.livejournal.com]

THank you!

[laughingacademy.livejournal.com]

That is super, super cool.

Also, I came perilously close to a spit-take when I read your last sentence.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Hahaahah, thank you!

[marchek.livejournal.com]

That is awesome news!

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[contrarywise]

That's so awesome!! Congratulations!!!

As for what to wear, go for something light. It gets hot in the UK, especially in July. Not the pinstripe suit, although it would make an awesome subtle in-joke.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

That's the lighter of my two suits, but I already ruled it out. I blush very easily, and that in-joke would have me looking like something was up.

[frederich.livejournal.com]

Meanwhile, and this isn't even a joke -- this shit is fraught for me for I hope obvious reasons -- what do I wear?

But Racheline, you know the answer to this.

You ask what should the Costume be? I ask in return, who is the Character? More precisely, how do you want that Character to be perceived? The Costume always flows from the Character; why, someone might say, the Costume is the Character.

Wise is the person who said that.

[rm.livejournal.com]

This is part of the problem, I am uncertain as to the character.

[delchi.livejournal.com]

Huzzah!

Also : I'm glad to see you mention Firefly. The one thing I have found universal with all of the firefly fans / groups and such that I have participated in is this giant eats-everything-you-are void surrounding the death of Wash. It overtakes the death of Book, and ( kinda understandably ) Mr. Universe.

The only thing I found that kinda made me upset about the death of Wash was how it paralleled the death of Trinity in The Matrix, at least in the sense of the death scenes were remarkably similar ( piloting through an impossible situation , landing safe, death. ).

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

Firefly is the odd one out in my three examples though. Fan reaction was intense, but the defictionalization element in it was much less present.

[ladyaelfwynn.livejournal.com]

Congrats!

Wish I were going to either Bristol for whatever it is or Infinitus but 2010 is our quieter year with the biggish trip being Atlanta for DragonCon.

When talking HP don't forget Lupin and Tonks. When I found out through an accidental spoiler what happened, I was at work and had to go lock myself in a bathroom stall and sob as quietly as possible. I was in tears the whole metro ride home. A part of me realized just how goofy it was. I kept thinking, "How in hell am I going to explain this if anyone at work should ask why I'm so upset?" Replying, "My most favorite fictional character just died," would get me laughed at even though Lupin's death was a tangible thing to me. I've mourned more for Lupin than some of my own family.

What to wear...hmmm...do you have a linen suit? Do you want to look professorial? Do you want to play up or play down your femininity? What else is going on at the conference? Will you be cosplaying at all? How scholarly do you want to look?

I know it's a lot of questions but each of those impact on the choices you make. For what it's worth, I'm envisioning you wearing a lovely pale cream/white (whatever that pale neutral whitish shade is that best suits your complexion) linen suit with perhaps a deep mint/sage green dress shirt and a dark tie.

Good luck!

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

It's an academic conference, there is no cosplaying.

The land of HP is strange, and I may do a version of this for Infinitus, but there's been, as far as I can tell a marked difference in acts of mourning deaigned to defictionalize as regards Snape vs. the rest of the really high HP bodycount.

As someone who cried at work over the Ianto thing, I so hear you in the sense of "and what do I say about this?"

[wynkat1313.livejournal.com]

wow! Congrats! I know its a ways in the future, but will there be a chance for us non attenders to get to read your paper when its done? It sounds fascinating!

[rm.livejournal.com]

I'm hoping to get it published, and suspect I'll be able to, so eventually yes.

[graene.livejournal.com]

Woot! So excited for you.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[byzantienne.livejournal.com]

Hell yes~

I will be there too, with my mad Byzantine letters/fanwork/exile thing. We should actually, y'know. Meet in person. (Considering we live across town from one another, ha.)

Congratulations -- I'm so excited about this.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Oh AWESOME. THAT IS SO EXCITING. There's a third NYC'er going. We should all get together at some point. This is rad.

[drinkingcocoa.livejournal.com]

So excited for you! I hear you about the no-advanced-degree feeling. But of course it's the content that matters, and goodness knows we've seen plenty of professors who aren't compelling.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm pretty good at being able to keep up, and I give good panel, so I'm not really worried. But I do have to find a better/more solid response when people ask my affiliations or where I teach (which has happened to me before).

[jgcr.livejournal.com]

Ooooh. Any thought of working in older examples, like the reaction to Little Nell's death? (Or Sherlock Holmes)?

[rm.livejournal.com]

Sherlock Holmes and the apocrypha related to fan reaction to his death is very present in this. I'm still collecting sort of deciding on the rest of my historical literary examples.

[glinda-w.livejournal.com]

This is fascinating stuff. I knew about the Sherlock Holmes reader reaction, but - that CFP thing? I want to just sit here and squee in a fangirl way and babble happily. (I'm not much into fandoms as such, but got hit with this mourning a fictional character thing when Haley was killed on Criminal Minds.) (Oh, and in books. Readers of Brust's Vlad Taltos series will know what I mean when I say I have trouble re-reading _Issola_...)

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I'm pretty excited about it.