| Driessen, Simone and Jones, Bethan 2025. Fandom’s dark side: Uncovering the intricacies of conspiratorial play as digital practice. Le Clue, Natalie, ed. Beyond Fandom: The Dark Side of Social Media Discourse, London: Emerald Publishing Limited, pp. 95-109. (10.1108/978-1-83608-482-220251007) |
Abstract
Fans engage with their fandoms both online and offline. While offline engagement is not new, digital fan participation has increasingly exposed a ‘darker’ side to fannish play. This phenomenon is facilitated by easier access to public figures, advancements in technology and the global reach of fannish communities. This chapter explores how fans navigate and negotiate easter eggs, hidden messages within (fannish) texts and reinterpretations of fictional texts. Drawing upon theories of fanspiracy, mediatised play and forensic fandom, we highlight the digital practices of dedicated fan groups such as Swifties, Taylor Swift’s followers, and Philes, enthusiasts of the television series The X-Files. These fans engage in activities such as dissecting scripts and lyrics, decoding social media posts and analysing music videos and episodes to find hidden meanings and potential connections. Through this lens, activities like deciphering cryptic clues, formulating fannish theories and participating in collaborative sleuthing, fans seemingly reinterpret these clues and messages in playful endeavours, which provide fans with a sense of agency and community. Focusing on these two long-term fandoms, we gain insights into how they navigate and respond to evolving fan theories. We argue that these fannish practices show likeliness to conspiratorial play. Although rooted in popular culture fandoms, these practices offer a framework for understanding broader societal conspiracies and therefore move beyond the confines of fandom.
| Item Type: | Book Section |
|---|---|
| Date Type: | Publication |
| Status: | In Press |
| Schools: | Schools > Journalism, Media and Culture |
| Publisher: | Emerald Publishing Limited |
| ISBN: | 978-1836084839 |
| Last Modified: | 26 Aug 2025 13:45 |
| URI: | https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/180657 |
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