Fandom is a term that is quickly sweeping the nation, and if you don’t understand what it is… Well, you may be swept into a current of pop culture events and terms that you may not completely understand. The definition of a fandom is basically the fans of particular TV shows, movies, books, games, bands, whatever it is that can have a fan following. Calling oneself a part of a fandom is relatively popular among the young adult generation.
If you say you’ve never been part of a fandom, I’m calling you a liar right now. Fandoms are not just limited to TV shows, movies and books, as mentioned above. For example, sports teams. I would consider myself a part of the "Ravens" fandom, as I am part of the community that supports the Ravens.
Within fandoms, there are many new terms that can throw you for a loop. For example, the word "ship." This term is a shortened version of "relationship", in which you wish (or support) two people in a relationship. For example, in the fandom of Harry Potter, the ship of the protagonist, Harry, and his eventual-girlfriend-turned-wife, Ginny, is affectionately nicknamed "Hinny".
If you value one particular ship above all others, that’s called an "OTP" or "One True Pairing". One of the most popular ships, often called an OTP by many a fandom girls and boys, is the pairing of Emma Swan and Killian Jones from the popular TV show "Once Upon A Time", called "Captain Swan".
One more important term to know is the "canon". Canon is when something is official, in the sense that is officially happened. Sometimes people use the term canon to describe a ship on a TV show or movie. For example, Harry and Ginny dating and eventually marrying are canon.
If you’ve heard of fandoms already and understand just how much fandoms are taking over the pop culture world, than you’ve heard of a comic con, especially the San Diego Comic Con.
Comic Con is a pop culture phenomenon in which thousands upon thousands of fans of various fandoms dress up as their favorite characters, and gather together for chances to possibly meet and take a picture (for the right price, that is) with the famous celebrities that are in attendance.
Almost every state has their own version of a comic con. DC has an annual con called Awesome Con. This year, many famous fandom celebrities will be in attendance; some of the biggest names from British fandoms will be there (for those that watch "Doctor Who", Peter Capaldi (the most recent version of The Doctor) and his now-former companion Jenna Coleman (Clara) will be in attendance).
While Awesome Con is in fact, growing larger each year, it is no match for the San Diego Comic Con. When people say "Comic Con", they are almost always referring to the San Diego branch. The first San Diego Comic Con occurred in 1970 and had 300 people in attendance. That event had about 25 booths and three speakers. In 2014, they had over 130,000 attendees. If you don’t think that a lot of people, my hometown of Hampstead has less than 7,000 people living in it.
So, in short, those of us in the fandom have our own language and ideas, and it can get pretty confusing if you’re not up to date. I know we all can sound like pirates, with our ships and our canons, but we are just fans. Granted, we tend to be passionate, but there are worse things we could be passionate about, right?
