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

yet understandable enough, to introduce an unfamiliar audience to the topic.
Yet, such a single ethnographic moment does not exist. All of the scenes
depicted above are, after all, not simply moments of ritual or hobby, but
moreover are infused with a certain mode of identity. Beyond serving an
introductory function, they urge you to immerse yourself into a world that will
seem alien at best.
B. Academia vs. Fandom: The agenda of this
project
Perhaps only a fan can appreciate the depth of feeling, the
gratifications, the importance for coping with everyday life
that fandom represents. Yet we are all fans of something.
WE respect, admire, desire. We distinguish and form
commitments. By endeavoring to understand the fan
impulse, we ultimately move towards a greater
understanding of ourselves. (Lewis 1)
This excerpt from Lisa Lewis’s introduction to The Adoring Audience
(1992) is aimed at an academic audience. Speaking to us, as academics, she
aptly outlines both, a fan’s fervid devotion, often accompanied by our
incomprehension, to her/his fandom as well as shared aspects of activity and
identity between academia and fandom which may allow for a comparison of
the two contexts.
As Matt Hills (2002) describes it, both on the academic as well as the
fannish front the emphasis lies on the “good” imagined subjectivity. However,
in the academic world this “good” imagined subjectivity is often qualified by
the concept of “the rational self.” By “subjectivity” he does not mean the
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