introduCtion: AdAptAtion in A ConvergenCe environMent
19
As Julie Sanders has argued, adaptation “signals a relationship with an
informing source text or original,” whereas appropriation “frequently affects
a more decisive journey away from the informing source into a wholly new
cultural product and domain.” In this sense, one could ask what lies behind
the classification of fanfictions as adaptation or appropriation. Such texts,
while they announce their relationship with a source text paratextually,
could, in some cases, be argued to move the characters, settings, and so
forth “into a wholly new cultural product and domain.” Far from reinstating
preconceived boundaries between official and unofficial (and by implication
more or less valid) adaptations, we should rather ask what is gained and what
is overlooked by regarding e.g. Watson/Holmes slash fiction, i.e. fanfiction
that depicts a homosexual relationship between Sherlock Holmes and Dr
Watson, as adaptation as opposed to appropriation (or vice versa)? Such
fan works establish a clear relationship to an original – often the BBC show
Sherlock (2010–) – but transform it according to the rules of their community.
But does this mean that their rewriting no longer “remains ostensibly”
Sherlock and therefore falls out of Sanders’ definition of adaptation? 26 If not,
where do they move into the territory of appropriation or beyond it? Should
we even care? What critical benefit and analytical sharpness can we draw
from such a distinction? And finally, where does our question come from:
are economic interests, the authorial or corporate control over a text, central
for our question or do we simply perpetuate a certain cultural hierarchy
surrounding “official” texts? Why should we accept Bollywood adaptations
of Jane Austen, which transform the text to fit generic patterns and audience
expectations, but not fan adaptations, which likewise transform a fiction
according to dominant genre conventions, merely subcultural and less
recognized ones like the slash or hurt/comfort genre? 27 Rather than trying
to (re-)establish a boundary between official texts that remain “faithful”
and unofficial (and by implication less valuable) fan works, a distinction
that has haunted mainstream discussions of fandom for too long, the goal
needs to be to see what is gained from discussing different fan works as
acts of adaptation.
26 Ibid., 26.
27 On the point of pornographic (fan) adaptations and the generic questions of locating them,
see Kyle Meikle, “Pornographic Adaptation: Parody, Fan Fiction, and the Limits of Genre,” Journal
of Adaptation in Film & Performance 8, no. 2 (2015): 123–140. On slash fiction and its relation to
official products more broadly, as well as the different questions fan studies raises when studying
media franchises, see e.g. Vera Cuntz-Leng, Harry Potter que(e)r: Eine Filmsaga im Spannungsfeld
von Queer Reading, Slash-Fandom und Fantasyfilmgenre (Bielefeld: transcript, 2015).
19
As Julie Sanders has argued, adaptation “signals a relationship with an
informing source text or original,” whereas appropriation “frequently affects
a more decisive journey away from the informing source into a wholly new
cultural product and domain.” In this sense, one could ask what lies behind
the classification of fanfictions as adaptation or appropriation. Such texts,
while they announce their relationship with a source text paratextually,
could, in some cases, be argued to move the characters, settings, and so
forth “into a wholly new cultural product and domain.” Far from reinstating
preconceived boundaries between official and unofficial (and by implication
more or less valid) adaptations, we should rather ask what is gained and what
is overlooked by regarding e.g. Watson/Holmes slash fiction, i.e. fanfiction
that depicts a homosexual relationship between Sherlock Holmes and Dr
Watson, as adaptation as opposed to appropriation (or vice versa)? Such
fan works establish a clear relationship to an original – often the BBC show
Sherlock (2010–) – but transform it according to the rules of their community.
But does this mean that their rewriting no longer “remains ostensibly”
Sherlock and therefore falls out of Sanders’ definition of adaptation? 26 If not,
where do they move into the territory of appropriation or beyond it? Should
we even care? What critical benefit and analytical sharpness can we draw
from such a distinction? And finally, where does our question come from:
are economic interests, the authorial or corporate control over a text, central
for our question or do we simply perpetuate a certain cultural hierarchy
surrounding “official” texts? Why should we accept Bollywood adaptations
of Jane Austen, which transform the text to fit generic patterns and audience
expectations, but not fan adaptations, which likewise transform a fiction
according to dominant genre conventions, merely subcultural and less
recognized ones like the slash or hurt/comfort genre? 27 Rather than trying
to (re-)establish a boundary between official texts that remain “faithful”
and unofficial (and by implication less valuable) fan works, a distinction
that has haunted mainstream discussions of fandom for too long, the goal
needs to be to see what is gained from discussing different fan works as
acts of adaptation.
26 Ibid., 26.
27 On the point of pornographic (fan) adaptations and the generic questions of locating them,
see Kyle Meikle, “Pornographic Adaptation: Parody, Fan Fiction, and the Limits of Genre,” Journal
of Adaptation in Film & Performance 8, no. 2 (2015): 123–140. On slash fiction and its relation to
official products more broadly, as well as the different questions fan studies raises when studying
media franchises, see e.g. Vera Cuntz-Leng, Harry Potter que(e)r: Eine Filmsaga im Spannungsfeld
von Queer Reading, Slash-Fandom und Fantasyfilmgenre (Bielefeld: transcript, 2015).