Fan fiction has changed the literary world by creating a community where authors and readers can interact directly and instantly. It allows fans to engage with stories without judgment from outsiders. The presentation discusses how fan fiction emerged as a form of social storytelling online, with websites like Archive of Our Own and FanFiction.net facilitating the sharing of stories. It also notes that fan fiction writers are often minorities and LGBTQ+ individuals who use the genre for representation and expression.

1. Modern Day Storytelling
A Presentation by
Lauren Rouse, MAE Candidate

2. Key Terms
❏ Fan fiction
❏ “Beta-readers”
❏ Archive Of Our Own, Fanfiction.net
❏ Slash fiction

3. Thesis
Fan fiction has changed the literary world
and the way that books are published, all
while creating a world where authors and
readers interact on a direct and instantaneous
level and where fans can be fans, without
judgement from the outside world; thus,
bringing back a society of social storytelling.

4. What is
fanfiction?
Fanfiction is fiction about a popular
original work, created by fans of the
original work, instead of the creator.
Typically fanfiction is categorized as
a transformative work, meaning that
the original work has been
transformed into something else.

5. Who writes it?
❏ The majority of authors who write or
produce fanfiction are females,
minorities, or people who identify as
LGBTQ+.
“Archive of Our Own found that more of its
users identified as genderqueer (6 percent)
than as male (4 percent).”

6. Author and Reader
Interaction

7. Beta Reading
“Websites like fanfiction.net requires authors to have ‘beta-readers’
(betas) or someone to look over their work before publishing. Readers
can apply for these positions, and are, ‘qualified to read fictions from
the genre, and can provide the sort of focused feedback that the author
wants’ (Black 598). Authors may need help with plot development,
characterization, background information about the fandom, or simple
grammar and spelling help. Betas are influential in the publishing of a
fic, and can even gain editing, writing, and publishing skills of their
own. Future writers benefit so much from publishing and writing their
own fanfiction.”

8. Online Publishing

9. archiveofourown.org
❏ Non-profit, open source website
❏ Favored by writers
❏ Stories are sorted by tags
❏ Hits and kudos
❏ More organized than ff.net
❏ Better reader format on mobile devices
❏ Post “NC17+” like fanfiction
27,460 fandoms; 1,388,000 users; and 3,643,000 works

11. ff.net
❏ Readers can apply to be betas
❏ ff.net is more popular and older
❏ Many authors, including Anne Rice, Dennis L. McKieran, and
P.N. Elrod, have asked that stories centered on their works be
removed from the website
❏ Disallows any self-fics or fiction surrounding real life
celebrities
❏ Moreover, ff.net has a vast amount of anime fiction
Over 777,000 fics based on Harry Potter

13. Negative Connotations

14. Copyright Infringement
“The Congress shall have Power [...] to promote the
Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited
Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their
respective Writings and Discoveries”
❏ Works of Authorship
❏ Ideas are not copyrighted
❏ Derivative Works
❏ Imitative works can be produced
❏ Fair Use
❏ Transformative works are covered

15. Explicit
Content
❏ Slash Fiction?
❏ Age Issues

16. The authors
In a recent discussion with classmates, I found
a very common misconception about
fanfiction. This misconception is that
fanfiction writers are “bad” writers. They do
not understand how plot devices work; they
are just stealing ideas from someone else; it is
not “literary.”

17. Fan Fiction &
Intersectional
Feminism

18. Equal Representation
❏ First, second, and third wave feminism
❏ Fourth wave feminism
❏ Equal pay (?)

19. Influence

20. A Cyclical Movement
“Perhaps one of the main reasons why people are
saying such nice things about fanfiction is that it
takes us away from the notion of texts as static
isolated objects and instead reminds us that
storyworlds are generated and experienced within
specific social and cultural environments that are
subject to constant change.” - Bowen Thomas

21. Literature Review

22. ● ArchiveOfOurOwn. The Organization for Transformative
Works, 2008, https://archiveofourown.org
● Avocado. “The Cassandra Claire Plagiarism Debacle --
Intro through Part IV.” bad penny, 4 Aug. 2004, Retrieved
on 7 Nov. 2008. http://www.webcitation.org/6ApcmEOw1 .
Accessed 4 March 2018.
● Barton, Kristin M., and Jonathan Malcolm Lampley,
editors. fan CULTure. McFarland & Company, Inc.,
Publishers, 2014.
● Black, Rebecca Ward. “Just Don’t Call Them Cartoons: The
New Literacy Spaces of Anime,
● Manga, and Fanfiction.” Handbook of Research on New
Literacies, edited by Coiro, et al., pp. 583-610.
● Bromwich,
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/04/style/tumblr-shippers.
html
● Coiro, Julie, et al. Handbook of Research on New
Literacies. Taylor and Francis Group, LLC, 2008.
● De Kosnik, Abigail. “Should Fan Fiction Be Free?” Cinema
Journal, Vol. 48, No. 4, 2009, pp. 118-124.
● Fanfiction.net. Xing Li, 1998, https://www.fanfiction.net/
● Freeman, Megan. “A Fanspeak Dictionary.” Expressions,
2004. http://expressions.populli.net/dictionary.html .
Accessed 4 March 2018.
● Frey, J. M. “How Fanfiction Made Me Gay.” The Secret
Lives of Geek Girls, edited by Nicholson, pp. 53-60.
● Grady, Constance. “Why we’re terrified of fanfiction.” Vox,
2 June 2016.
https://www.vox.com/2016/6/2/11531406/why-were-terrifie
d-fanfiction-teen-girls . Accessed 22 Feb. 2018.
● Graham, Anissa M. “A New Kind of Pandering:
Supernatural and the World of Fanfiction.” fanCULTure,
edited by Barton and Lampley, pp. 131-145.
● Herman, Barbara. “What Is Wattpad? The 'YouTube For
Stories' Is Transforming Book Publishing.” International
Buisness Times, 23 Oct. 2014.
http://www.ibtimes.com/what-wattpad-youtube-stories-tran
sforming-book-publishing-1710151 . Accessed 26 Feb.
2018.
● Hellekson, Karen and Kristina Busse, editors. The
Fanfiction Studies Reader. University of Iowa Press, 2014.
● Jenkins, Henry. “Textual Poachers.” The Fanfiction Studies
Reader, edited by Hellekson and Busse, pp. 26-43.
● Johns, Adrian. The Nature of the Book: Print and
Knowledge in the Making. Chicago, IL: The University of
Chicago Press, 1998, pp 1-36.

23. ● Jones, Sara Gwellian. “The Sex Lives of Cult Television
Characters.” The Fanfiction Studies Reader, edited by
Hellekson and Busse, pp. 116-130.
● Kindle Worlds. Amazon.com, 1996.
https://kindleworlds.amazon.com/ .
● Nicholson, Hope, editor. The Secret Lives of Geek Girls.
Dark Horse Books, 2015.
● Rampton, Martha. “Four Waves of Feminism.” Pacific
Magazine, 25 Oct. 2015,
https://www.pacificu.edu/about/media/four-waves-feminism
. Accessed 2 March 2018.
● Rochester, Sophie. “Wattpad: Building the world’s biggest
reader and writer community.” The Literary Platform, 18
Oct. 2012.
http://theliteraryplatform.com/magazine/2012/10/wattpad-b
uilding-the-worlds-biggest-reader-and-writer-community/ .
Accessed 26 Feb. 2018.
● Russ, Joanna. “Pornography by Women for Women, with
Love.” The Fanfiction Studies Reader, edited by Hellekson
and Busse, pp. 75-81.
● Emmagrant01. Interview with Cassie Claire. Slashcast
Insider Interview, 2006.
● Spangler, Todd. “Wattpad Banks $51 Million From Tencent,
Other Investors to Fund Entertainment Projects.” Variety, 17
Jan. 2018.
http://variety.com/2018/digital/news/wattpad-funding-tence
nt-tv-film-entertainment-1202666935/ . Accessed 26 Feb.
2018.
● Thomas, Angela. “Community, Culture, and Citizenship in
Cyberspace.” Handbook of Research on New Literacies,
edited by Coiro, et al., pp. 671-697.
● Thomas, Bronwen. “What is Fanfiction and Why are People
Saying Such Nice Things about It?”
● StoryWorlds: A Journal of Narrative Studies, Vol. 3, 2011,
pp. 1-24.
● Tresca, Don. “Spellbound: An Analysis of Adult-Oriented
Harry Potter Fanfiction.” fan CULTure, edited by Barton
and Lampley, pp. 36-46.
● United States Copyright Law. Copyright Law of the United
States, U.S. Copyright Office,
https://www.copyright.gov/title17/title17.pdf
● Wattpad.com. Lau, Allen and Ivan Yuen, 2002.
https://www.wattpad.com/