Fic-Privileging on Fanlore and Limitations to Fannish Diversity

[kylara]

Following a discussion in Talk:Tentaclefic, RatCreature suggested bringing the topic up in the community to raise awareness of the issue and hopefully get some more input on what to do about it. The topic began with the suggestion that the "Tentaclefic" article, which address tentacles in fandom and fanworks more broadly than just fic, be renamed to incorporate other mediums of fanwork. This expanded into a broader discussion on what to do about other such named articles and fic-privileging on Fanlore.

I'm mostly from anime/manga fandom. From the discussion it seems that fic is the core of many Western-sourced fandoms which would explain the fic-centricism on Fanlore. Fic is also important in anime/manga fandom, but quite a lot of activity is also focused on visual mediums such as fanart, webcomics, and manga-style doujinshi. Tropes aren't limited to written fiction, and fic-centered terms are not as prevalent.

I'm concerned that when topics (such as tentacles) have articles with fic-centered instead of inclusive names, that this works at the exclusion of other mediums of fanworks. I would like to see more anime/manga information brought into Fanlore, and so far the inclusion has been rather limited (which could be for a number of reasons besides). Still, I would like to see Fanlore remain welcoming to expansion.

So how about it? Ideas on how to be more mindful to non-fic fanworks? RatCreature's also looking for ideas on how to rename topics like "wingfic," "apocafic," and others which are not inherently fic-centric.

Comments

[ratcreature]

Well, as the person who initially made the page as tentaclefic, while I know of hentai, I've always thought that an original thing, and not really connected to fandom output in any close way, except that there are tentacles in both. But then the same can be said about lots of stuff. I never watched hentai and I don't follow any anime or manga fandoms. And the only fandom output with tentacles I could think of were stories. So yeah, in a fandom context I foremost thought of it as a fic thing.

Also because I think of tentacles as kink and that in my mind as far as fandom kinks go those are primarily something written not anything visual, probably because don't use pictures as porn myself. So while of course I know intellectually that a ton of people make use of visual porn, if I don't think it through deliberately any tropes I think of as kinks I think of as "such-and-such-fic" like slavefic, hookerfic, rapefic, etc. unless I keep in mind deliberately to be inclusive. And that is even though I don't write fic myself, but only draw fanart (if not often).

[kylara]

That's really interesting, because it's entirely the other way around for me. It's really strange for me to think of tentacles in fic without other fanworks, hentai, and anime fandom; in fact, I think of tentacles as a predominantly visual form, with fic secondary. And up until this discussion began, I mostly figured the tentacles used in fic and other fanworks, including those outside anime/manga fandom, were directly influenced by hentai. This might be from my exposure to hentai, as well as fanworks with tentacle monsters, and being from general anime/manga fandom where the tentacle monster is legendary. Right now I'm reading the SGA fic listed on the page, and at least that one seems to be influenced by the hentai-based tentacle monster.

I was rather surprised to see tentacles applied to alien genitalia, e.g. Spock, as described on the article page. That was an aspect of "tentacle" usage I was not aware of, and I haven't seen it in general anime/manga fandom. In anime, it's mostly in the form of the tentacle monster. (Admittedly my exposure to hentai has been limited, and tentacle-genitalia is probably out there somewhere.) But it's not all hentai-derived, and there are portions which developed separately.

This entire discussion has me wanting to read more tentaclefic now. I'm happy some are linked on the page.