Valerie Estelle Frankel - Fan Phenomena: Harry Potter

Credits

First published in the UK in 2019 by Intellect Books, The Mill, Parnall Road, Fishponds, Bristol, BS16 3JG, UK

First published in the USA in 2019 by Intellect Books, The University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA

Copyright 2019 Intellect Ltd

Editor: Valerie Estelle Frankel

Production Editor: Naomi Curston

Copy Editor: Emma Rhys

Typesetting and Cover Design: Aleksandra Szumlas

Inside front cover image: Shana Mosella, Anime Los Angeles.

Ontario, CA, 2017. Photo by Michael Benedict.

Inside back cover image: Ray Bender aka Aunt Tessy Cosplay plays Boggart-Snape at Comic-Con. San Diego, CA, 2018.

Photo by Valerie Estelle Frankel.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written consent.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Fan Phenomena Series

ISSN: 2051-4468

eISSN: 2051-4476

Fan Phenomena: Harry Potter

ISBN: 978-1-78938-070-5

ePDF: 978-1-78938-072-9

ePUB: 978-1-78938-071-2

Printed and bound by

Hobbs, UK.

The State of Potter Today

Harry Potter, as well as being the bestselling childrens book series (Rowling, 19972007) of all time, has defined the meaning of fandom. As it debuted around the same time as the Internet came to popularity, fanfiction, fanart and fanvids showed what this new tool could offer. Wizard rock crowded Myspace and Bandcamp, even as YouTube, DeviantArt and FanFiction.net welcomed all comers with their creativity.

In the midst of all this, the massive, celebrated fansites like The Leaky Cauldron and MuggleNet were the place to be. In fact, in a gesture of basically unprecedented support for her fan community, J. K. Rowling invited the webmasters of these two sites, Emerson Spartz of MuggleNet and Melissa Anelli of The Leaky Cauldron, to Scotland to read book six and interview her. Rowling also showed support for these and other websites with the J. K. Rowling Fan Site Awards, saluting the fans who put so much effort into celebrating her works.

Of course, in person fans could really strut their stuff. Aside from general fantasy conventions, from Comic-Con to Worldcon, several tracks of specifically Potter conferences suddenly materialized. These, sponsored by HP Education Fanon, Inc. (Nimbus 2003, The Witching Hour, Lumos, Prophecy 2007, Portus, Azkatraz, Infinitus and Ascendio 2012) and by the educational group Narrate Conferences (Phoenix Rising 2007 and Terminus 2008), focused heavily on academic papers and speculation on how the series would end. This was the height of Potterdom, with Rowlings clues and twist endings providing endless fuel for speculation. Enterprising fans mapped out Hogwarts or described Ginnys mythic roots in everything from King Arthur to Red Riding Hood. Held only weeks after book seven was published, Prophecy 2007 saluted the perished characters with shrines, where fans could leave spontaneous gifts of socks for Dobby and hotel bottles of shampoo for Professor Snape. While some actors attended these conferences, the real stars were Potter and fan culture professors like John Granger and Henry Jenkins. They taught actual Potter classes back at their universities too, leading to a new level not just of scholarship but also of academic respect for the Potterheads. Books like Hogs Head Conversations (Prinzi, 2009) and Teaching with Harry Potter (Frankel, 2013) emphasized new avenues for fandom as popular culture gained a new respect in academics.

The conferences also offered a place to celebrate the lighter side of Potter fanfiction and art, cosplay and wizard rock concerts far into the night. Some conferences pushed this to the logical conclusion and structured the conference like a school, with crafting class, dance class, History of Magic, mythology, writing and anything else that fit the bill. Balls, fashion shows and unusual experiments like Water Quidditch and parody plays gave the fans delightful places to show off. MISTI-Con (2013ongoing) a deliberately small New England gathering, kicked off a steady intimate get-together, while a few cities and universities began annual Potter fairs. Adding the theme parks, computer games, films and Pottermore itself, the official world was expanding into well, an entire world indeed. The unofficial events expanded alongside it.

Figure 1: Yuki the Destroyer, Online Comic and at Comic-Con 2018.

Still, some parts of the Potterverse ran their course and began to fade. The yearly music festival Wrockstock stretched from 2007 to 2013, but some of the wrockers began retiring. Meanwhile, the conferences faded into the less academic LeakyCons (begun in 2009 by The Leaky Cauldron and still ongoing in 2018), which invited young adult authors to help celebrate an expanding world beyond the Potterverse. LeakyCon began to fill with crossover fans sporting mockingjay pins and Camp Half-Blood T-shirts as teen dystopia and Percy Jackson novels succeeded Harrys legacy.

Fan groups in major cities persevered, with the staff changing but the trivia nights, gaming afternoons and cosplay adventures stretching for decades. Even as the New York wizards skated in costume at the Rockefeller Center and the Los Angeles branch headed off to the beach to visit Shell Cottage or the theme park after it opened the fandom was going strong. The Harry Potter Alliance (HP Alliance), a social action group founded by Andrew Slack in 2005, continued to engage millions of fans with over a hundred international chapters. Quidditch, founded at colleges across the world, lasted as a sport, with an annual Quidditch Cup. Themed camps for younger kids across the US heavy in crafts and Quidditch helped them share in the love of Potter. Libraries hosted parties and events, especially to coincide with Harrys birthday or the release of new material in 2016.

Figure 2: Ray Bender aka Aunt Tessy Cosplay plays Boggart-Snape at Comic-Con 2018.

This included the London and Broadway play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (Rowling, Thorne and Tiffany, 2016) and the new film franchise Fantastic Beasts, along with the new backstory of Ilvermorny, the American school of magic, presented on Pottermore (admittedly amid some controversy about cultural appropriation). After the drought since 2007, fans finally had new stories. These too produced special celebrations at the conventions as the attendees at