Girls who like Boys who like Boys – Ethnography of ... - Yuuyami.com

invests into the fanfiction she writes, it is important to Dinah to adhere to the
canon offered in the original text as much as possible. Fanfiction is often an
outlet fans will use to explore alternate storylines or to investigate “what ifs,”
and, in that sense, fanfiction in general and slash fanfic in particular expand
and sometimes operate outside of canon: No fanfic will be an exact replica of
the source text, but rather builds on it, and evolves in a process which is more
often than not communal.
Slash fanfic as a whole is a matter of personal interpretation, and
though Dinah has written some slash fanfic for a specific pairing, she does not
see many other pairings; she explains this interpretation as subject to each
individual’s viewing of the source text:
I think slash writers often find the subtext in the books, so a
popular pairing is Remus/Sirius: People see that they were
best friends when they were young, now are lost souls, and
so “let’s re-unite them!” It all depends on events and how
you interpret them. I don’t see Harry/Draco at all, I think
it’s ludicrous; I don’t see Harry/Ron either, even though
they’re best friends. But they’re just best friends, and that’s
how I see it.
Even though Dinah is very much into the Harry Potter fandom, she hesitates
to proclaim her status as a fervid fan: While she knows all the news and
gossip, she says, she doesn’t consider herself as into it as many other people
do. Though her involvement with the source material is equal to that of other
fans, and she has managed to find a circle of connections and friends within
the HP fandom, even being known by name for her fanfic, there are several
issues that prevent Dinah from feeling fully involved in the wider community
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