Hello and welcome to This Week in Fandom, the OTW’s roundup of things that are happening. This week and last, events in fandom have largely centred on the Black Lives Matter movement and the protests and demonstrations taking place within America and around the world against racial injustice and police brutality. Racism and particularly anti-Black racism is a problem in fandoms and in fan studies as in other cultural spaces, so in the latter part of this roundup we wanted to share with you some of the links and resources that we’ve come across over the past week or so which provide ways to think about how these dynamics operate – as well as related content on the ways in which fandom can provide a space or a launchpad for activism.
First, a host of actors from fan-favourite media properties have been protesting for Black Lives Matter over the past two weeks and speaking out about their experiences: Kendrick Sampson (of How to Get Away with Murder and Insecure) wrote for Variety about police violence at the protests in LA; Halsey made a lengthy Instagram post about her experience protesting in the same city; and John Boyega’s appearance at the London Black Lives Matter protest prompted a cavalcade of Twitter responses to his statement that he ‘didn’t know if he’d have a career after this’. We also saw pop culture informing protestors’ activities, as Spiderman dropped in on protests on the Manhattan Bridge, and graffiti declaring that ‘Matter Black Lives Do’ appeared on a statue of Yoda outside Lucasfilm headquarters in San Francisco. Read More
