Fanon
From Fan History Wiki
Fanon, or fan canon, is when fans in a particular fandom decide to rewrite or invent new canon to the story. Generally something known as fanon is widely accepted in the fandom community.
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[edit] Examples of Fanon
[edit] Digimon
Season 02 of Digimon introduced Motomiya Daisuke as the new leader of the Chosen Children. In fandom, this character was often portrayed as an artist. Many pieces of fanfiction featured this aspect, including Cadela's Daikeru stories, Faded Jae's Daiken story "Fine Art," and Cynthia Harrell's Taito story Moment's Without You.
[edit] Harry Potter
The fanon of Leather Pants!Draco was beginning to develop, being spurred on by Heidi. This is demonstrated by a public post made by Heidi8 on October 2, 2000:
- I must say I've taken about as much time dwelling on how on earth to
- get Draco into leather pants as I have on any other more
- significant plot twist. I hope it's not too ridiculous....
[edit] Magnificent 7
Examples of fanon from Magnificent 7 include:
- JD is from "back east" (we do not know where JD is from, only that he arrived in town on a stage)
- Vin shares and cherishes Native American beliefs (we know he lived with two tribes, but under what circumstances was never revealed)
- The name of the town is "Four Corners" (the town's name was never mentioned)
- Vin's horse is named "Peso" (None of the horses were called by name on the show. Peso is the name of the equine actor who most frequently played Vin's horse.) [1]
[edit] Star Trek: The Original Series
According to Bernd Schneider at Ex Astris Scientia [2], "Uhura's first name Nyota"[3] is an example of fanon from the Star Trek: The Original Series fandom. It is also fanon that "Romulans did not have warp drive in 2266." [4]
[edit] Star Trek: Voyager
Where did the fanon idea from Star Trek: Voyager that Tom Paris was raped in prison come from? This idea first came from fen who had read it in a story by Brenda Atrim. The story worked this concept in so seemlessly that other people borrowed it for their own stories or assumed it was canon and referenced it in their own works. As more people did this, the idea perpetuated and perpetuated until there became honest debate within the fandom as to whether or not this idea was actually canon. (Donna Thelen)
[edit] Star Wars
Two examples of fanon in the Star Wars universe include ""An-Paj" the Healer with his many wives" [5] and "Qui-Gon's Master was Yoda." [6]
[edit] Westlife
Kian sticks out his tongue when he is concentrating. [7]
[edit] Historical Definitions
The following term dates to December 2001 in the Harry Potter fandom:
- Fanon: Usually found in fanfiction to describe certain storylines/ideas (AU or otherwise) created by fans/some fic author that has attained a level of notoriety/fame and has spawned its own fanfics by other authors. Not official canon descriptions of characters, but generally accepted by the fans.[8]
The following definition dates to August 2003 in the Sentinel fandom:
- "Fanon" is the term for facts or ideas that have been coined by fan fiction writers but haven't been seen in an actual episode. Some fanon ideas are so commonly used in fan fiction that readers may believe they are canon. For example, the idea that Detectives Rafe and Brown are partners is a fanon idea, not a canon one (although they do appear together in many episode scenes). [9]
The following definition dates to May 2004 in the Harry Potter, Horatio Hornblower and Pirates of the Caribbean fandoms:
- Fanon:
- “givens” about characters or universes that are created by fans but are accepted by some as extensions of the canon—some AUs become so large and wide-spread that the details they create for the characters (such as eye color or a first name) that weren’t specified in the canon become accepted as a substitute. Also, some authors refer to the details they’ve created in their own AUs (even if they aren’t widely read or written) as their personal fanon.[10]
The following definition dates to May 2005 in the slash, Westlife, and Lord of the Rings fandoms:
- Fanon - Something that has little or no roots in reality, but is used so widely in stories in a fandom that the fans in this fandom has come to accept it as a "fact". For example, I've actually never seen Kian stick his tongue out when he's concentrating (forgive me if I'm wrong!), but he commonly does it in fanfics. [11]
The following definition is from the MST community and dates to June 2005:
- Fanon - facts which are generally accepted within a genre's fanfiction community, but never appear in official continuity. Ex. Vegeta's full name being "Vegeta Briefs" is fanon. [12]
The following definition dates to December 2005 in the Harry Potter fandom:
- fanon - Concepts, ideas or beliefs about the series that have never been explicitly told to us by Rowling, but have become so commonly used in the fandom that they are taken as fact. For instance, before J.K. Rowling stated in a chat that Lily was in Gryffindor, fanon often placed her into Slytherin.[13]
The following definition is was written by Jane Leavell and updated in June 2006:
- FANON: "Fanon" is a detail about a particular show or character that was created by a fan but has now been generally borrowed/copied/accepted as canon by many other writers. For instance, in a story about THE SENTINEL, Susan Williams had Blair borrowing Jim's Cascade PD sweatshirt, and now sweatshirt-borrowing is often portrayed as Blair's habit in other stories by other writers, making it fanon. See also: CANON.[14]
The following definition dates to November 2006 in the Harry Potter fandom:
- Fanon
- Everything that's been written by fans, based on canon. The word is most often used when referring to a Fanfiction materials. Anything that is written by fans. Not published. Sometimes, after not reading books for a while, and reading a lot of fanon, people tend to get fanon and canon confused. To avoid this, reread the books. [15]
The following definition is from GAFF and dates to December 2006:
- Fanon: Fanon is a fact which isn’t given (or at least isn’t explicitly stated) in canon, but which nevertheless has become widely accepted as fact be the fans. Some of it makes sense, some of it leaves canon-purists hopping and spitting in impotent rage. also a set of invented background information filling in blanks in canon and adopted by one or more writers as truth when writing their fan fiction. [16]
The following definition dates to 2008 in the Superman fandom:
- Fanon - Things that are not strictly canon, but do not contradict it and are widely accepted by most fans. For instance if most fans just accept that Clark's middle name is Joseph (as it is in the comics), even though it is not expressly canon, it becomes fanon. [17]
