On fanwork's fleeting nature
Last time, in this post, we talked about fanwork’s immortality. To discuss its fleeting nature is not to discount that argument. Fanworks are no mayflowers, blooming once and then nevermore. Maybe they are mirages, light reflecting back in the most delicate patterns, but only visible when looked at from certain angles.
While, for the philosophy of unfinished works (those unfinished Works In Progresses that one can filter out on with Archive of Our Own’s search and filter functions are not exclusively meant here), one can turn to Derrida or Mark Fisher, for example, as immortality was in the context of conversation, this rumination is in relation to a work on library practices, Fan fiction in the library.
The papers discusses what librarians in training have to say on the question, with at least one pointing out the difficulty of archiving works that has change in its very nature. Online collections are mentioned but online collections need to either freeze moments in time or can only be for the present moment. A collection of a series of snapshots can serve as a diachronic approach, while an extensive, context-sensitive process would provide a synchronous image. To truly capture a mirage, maybe we need both the time, the angle of the viewer and the light and the object it mirrors. But in reality, most of the time, we can rely on the the sighter’s travelogue.
By now, there are certainly many good practices concerning the conservation of fanworks’, which would, as any conservation will rely on the conservationist’s priorities. So what are some things that you would want to preserve in fandoms and what approach would capture that best?
Price, Ludi, and Lyn Robinson. 2017. “Fan Fiction in the Library.” Transformative Works and Cultures, no. 25. http://dx.doi.org/10.3983/twc.2017.1090.
Poster: Szabo Dorottya
