Fanning Flames/Flaming Fans: Theorising Fanfiction

Abstract

Fanfiction is an enormously popular genre with a niche audience. And this niche is growing bigger and wider as more and more people join fan communities. These communities establish their virtual presence through fan labor, and fanfiction is a major contributor to the influence that a fandom constructs for itself.Juxtaposing this phenomenon with the rise of the digitization of literary spaces opens up the discourse about the evolution of literary spaces and genres. Fanfiction is the new item on the agenda that is garnering attention. Although quite a vast field of study, this paper is concerned with a uniform taxonomy and theory of Fanfiction.