COSPLAY,

COMICON, AND CREATIVITY: UNMASKING THE PHOENIX NERD

COMMUNITY


By

Harmony Huskinson






Has been approved
March, 2014

APPROVED (printed name, signature):


Dr. Diane Facinelli,


, Director


Dr. Suzanne Scott,

, Second Reader











ACCEPTED:













Dean, Barrett, the Honors College


TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction................................................................................................................................................4
Chapter One.................................................................................................................................................5
Whats in a Definition?.............................................................................................................................6
A (Brief) History..........................................................................................................................................8
Identity and Passion...............................................................................................................................10
Socially Awkward....................................................................................................................................12
Techies Versus Fans................................................................................................................................14
Creativity.....................................................................................................................................................17
Zeitgeist........................................................................................................................................................19
Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................20
Chapter Two.............................................................................................................................................21
The Beginning............................................................................................................................................22
$$$..................................................................................................................................................................23
Comicons.....................................................................................................................................................26
Way of Life..................................................................................................................................................29
Versus...........................................................................................................................................................32
Makers, Bronies, and Trekkies...........................................................................................................36
More Cons, Stronger Community (Conclusion) .........................................................................41
Chapter Three.........................................................................................................................................42
But Phoenix Isnt Just a Physical Place Anymore.......................................................................44
Phoenix Sprawl.........................................................................................................................................48
The Quest for Cultural Identity..........................................................................................................49

Epic Fail, Great Success.........................................................................................................................52

Conclusion..................................................................................................................................................55
Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................55
Works Cited..............................................................................................................................................58

INTRODUCTION
At Le Grande Orange Grocery in Phoenix, Arizona, I sit across from the
smirking face of Jeff Moriarty and attempt to define a nerd. When he hits me with
the question on the spot, I find myself flailing to sound knowledgeable and gathered.
One the essentials to me is, of a nerd, more than one, is passion, which is
pretty obvious, right? I think that in order to be a nerd, you have to be passionate
about what youre doing.
Hes not buying it. I continue.
But yes, youre squinting at me. Because on the opposite side of it, there are
people who define themselves as nerds who arent passionate about what theyre
watching, what theyre listening to but they say oh I like that.
And I go on like that for some time. Flailingly.
All in all, I definitely do not sound like a girl who is completing an honors
thesis on nerd culture.
Moriarty responds to my lengthy description with his own sense of nerddom,
broadening the term to foodies and photography buffs.
And though he intimidates me at the beginning of our conversation, an hour
later we are cracking jokes about watermelon amidst serious discussions about
communal fragmentation.
But in this awkward, rambling dialogue with Moriarty arises a realizationa
nerd is whatever you want it to be. A nerd is that moment where you embrace
excitement for something so wholeheartedly that it becomes a part of them.
Its also much more complicated than that.

This is my journey through Phoenix nerdom. I will attempt to describe

aspects of the Phoenix nerd community with the same awkward, friendly spirit as
that conversation and under that same caveatno matter how much a researcher
attempts to frame this culture, there will always be exceptions.
CHAPTER ONE
Defining Nerds (Or Not)

There is no single, universal geek identity, no one geek culture that is more real or
authentic than the others. Jason Tocci, Geek Cultures, p. 121

Picture a nerd. I dare you. Do it.
What do you see? Do you see a pasty skinned boy with thick black-rimmed
glasses, a pocket protector and high-waist pants? Do you see an obese man with a
barely-fitting T-shirt behind the counter at a comic book shop? Do you see a teenage
girl with acne and braces who cant find a date? Do you see a body in homemade
Storm Trooper armor? Do you see a booth babe in a Slave Leia outfit with nearly all
her skin showing? Do you see a teenage boy who hasnt left his room for three days
because he was playing Skyrim? Do you see Bill Gates in his dorm room building the
first personal computer?
These are all common images that might come to mind, but there are so
many more.
In this project I am using interviews to take a snapshot of nerds of all kinds in
Phoenix, Arizona. I am supplementing those personal interviews with literature and
I am crossing my fingers that it will all make sense.
Ill start with a literature review that will delve into a history of nerds and
geeks, take a sojourn into personal identity, and then Ill cover some nerd

characteristics such as creativity and social skills. Next, Ill segue into the growing
acceptance of nerd culture and how thats played out through commercialization
and comicons. This section will lead to a discussion about how growing pains might
splinter the culture, and how cons might stitch it back together. Then, Ill lay down
the difference between a culture and community, since nerds who watch anime in
their basement are not the same as nerds who are members of the local Doctor
Who fan club. Lastly, I will bring in the importance of social media to the
development of nerd community in the Phoenix area as a unique geographical
location.
Throughout the project I will include personal reactions to the conversations
Ive had, the events Ive attended and the places Ive visited. Overall, this thesis will
frame the Phoenix geek community from modern commentary, considering
togetherness and fostering meaning for ones own personal identity.
Whats in a Definition?

Consider this first chapter an anti-definition. It will attempt to avoid

shoehorning anyone with the personal identity of nerd or geek into one cultural
arena. A panelist from Phoenix Comicon, Jamie Whalen, described the situation
perfectly: I dont think theres one definition you can put. Because when you put a
definition to a nerd its like everybody sees it that way (Whalen and Dean). Its a
question of identity, not definition.

The breadth of Jason Toccis dissertation Geek Cultures suggests a dynamic,

evolving culture that could never be defined in one sentence (Tocci). From a chapter
about fans to a chapter about techno geeks to a chapter about geek chic, the 400-

page paper must purposefully lack focus. He writes that math, science, the internet,
games, superheroes, warriors, and other geeky staples are all part of some sort of
shared culture, some way of life (399). This work from 2009 was the first of its kind
to cover geek culture in its entirety and will be used as a frequent source in this
project.
Bob Beard, who calls himself the Nerd-in-Chief at PBS, is completing a
dissertation on authenticity among nerds. He is studying the conflict between real
nerds who were bullied in the 1980s versus nerds who came to the culture since its
recent inclusion in the mainstream. Essentially, Beard looks at a person wearing a
faded Optimus Prime T-shirt from Urban Outfitters who calls himself a nerd versus a
person involved in live action role playing since the age of 12 who calls herself a
nerd. The conflict touches upon the original nerds, a group of people who do not
want to welcome the cool kids into nerd culture, because those were the people
who used to pick on them (Beard).
But in the end, people from both sidesbullied or not bulliedare going to
call themselves nerds. As Beard said, its this weird thing where were all trying to
define it together.

And thats what it comes down totogether. Like it or not, this group of new

geeks has joined the quest to define nerd. The definition has yet again broadened to
include the mainstream, at least partially. And that modern surge in numbers has
had profoundly affected geek culture, as I will indicate in Chapter Two.

A (Brief) History

The word nerd originates from Dr. Seuss If I Ran the Zoo when a nerd

was listed as part of the zoos imaginary menagerie (Suess). Eventually, the word
reached its popularity as pejorative slang through the voice of Fonzie on Happy
Days in the 1970s and skits with Lisa Lupner on Saturday Night Live in the 1980s
(Eglash 2002) (Nugent).
The term geek has a larger backstory, dating to the 16th century Germanic
word geck, which meant fool, dupe, simpleton (Harper). For a time in the early
20th century, geek meant a circus performer who bit off the heads of live animals,
until it eventually reached a less frightening definition in the 1950s to describe an
overly diligent student (Tocci 18).
In American Nerd: The Story of My People, Benjamin Nugent writes about a
gradual transition from respect for the brute strength and physical finesse of jocks
in the early half of the 20th century to respect for the intellectual prowess of nerds in
the later half of the 20th century. Nerds, almost by definition, came to power in the
end, because modernity was on their side, but that didnt mean anybody had to like
them, he writes (38). This theory is a simplification of the classic conflict: geek
versus jock. Bernard Schober, a poet in the Phoenix area who goes by The Klute
and runs the Phoenix Nerd Poetry Slam, said the Cold War advanced the nerd image
via an attempt to surpass the Soviets.
And then you had the space shop, the Russian and American Space Race, and
Eisenhower, Kennedy all these people were like, Hey. Get smart because
thats the only way we can beat the Russians. We cant run to the moon. We
need geeks and nerds to build this stuff and do equations and all that.
(Schober)

Jonathan Simon, who covers Phoenix nerd culture with the blog Lightning Octopus,
said technology was instrumental in establishing nerd identity and spreading it as a
culture. In the 1980s, technology had just begun to sink into American culture,
pushing along that classic image of the socially awkward computer science student.
But by the time Simon had grown up and started to raise a family, everybody was
using computers. Back then if you were into computers you were a nerd. Today if
youre into computers youre just a person, theyre an American, Simon said. Nerd
and geek have moved beyond an interest for circuits and coding to a more fluid,
widely used terminology.

By the time NBC aired Freaks and Geeks, in 1999 the terms nerd and

geek had reached their complicated mixture of obsessive fan, perfect student,
socially awkward misfit and high school clique member (Nugent 69). Well aware of
these multi-faceted elements, today geeks debate the relevance and accuracy of a
sitcom about nerds The Big Bang Theory, which several of my interviewees
characterized as a stunted generalization of juvenile men with Aspergers-like
tendencies. When I brought this conflict up in a conversation with Simon, the nerd
blogger, he rolled his eyes and said, those people are clichs. At the same time,
these modern media start a dialogue around nerd culture as a mainstream entity;
numerous interviewees used it as an example of why nerds rule the world
(Simon). The Big Bang Theory also presents nerds as central characters living
everyday life. Unlike older representations like Revenge of the Nerds, the plot of
this television show isnt centered around stigmatization and vengeanceits about
their very existence as nerds. This depiction represents the shift I will write more

about in Chapter Two that allows geeks to be prideful versus strangely detached. Its
an identity rather than an insult.
Identity and Passion


Nerds love. They squee. They fangirl. They wait hours outside Wal-Mart in
the cold for the newest Playstation system. But what makes them any different from
someone who spends hours calculating Fantasy Football statistics or someone who
zealously keeps up with the Kardashians?

As I mulled over this conundrum with Simon, the nerd blogger, a question

arose. Is a nerd a nerd by how theyre seen or by how he defines himself? I asked,
which I quickly followed with, Thats a rhetorical question. Thank god (Simon).
Because while many people I interviewed say a key nerd characteristic is passion,
many others struggled to differentiate the passion of a sports junkie from the
passion of a Trekkie.

Some scholars write that its a question of legitimacy. While a sports fan

might follow the Broncos as vigorously as a Browncoat might debate Joss Whedons
Firefly in an online forum, only one of these gentlemen pursues traditionally
acceptable media. According to Tocci, thats because American society looks at
sports as the pursuit of masculinity and athleticismmanly men doing manly
things. Meanwhile, that Browncoat sits hunched over a computer debating an
imaginary world, isolating himself from what society considers the appropriate
dialogue. Tocci writes:
To the world at large, comics, games, and science-fiction generally represent
escapism, a substitute for real power among bookish and non-athletic boys.
The war paint of a sports fan somehow seems more manly and acceptable
than the war paint of a live-action role-player clad in chain mail. (300)

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In Ron Eglashs Race, Sex, and Nerds: From Black Geeks to Asian American
Hipsters, he writes that it boils down to particular technologies. While lawnmowers
and barbecues require physical labor, abstract technologies like coding and
mathematics keep nerd identity in a niche of diminished sexual presence (Eglash).
Because culture values the beefy, the nerdy vegetables remain uneaten.

However, as technology evolves, so do the concepts of masculinity. In Nerds,

Geeks, and the Hip/Square Dialectic in Contemporary Television, Christine Quail

contends that when everyone buys an iPhone, it cant really be nerdy or
unmasculine to own one. As computer and digital technologies have become
adopted by businesses and mass marketed to the public, such technologies have
become more socially acceptable and less nerd identified, she writes (467). But
even as the negativity around computers and geeky TV fades away, the words geek
and nerd remain in popular use. Thats part of what makes the situation so
confusing. It sounds weird to describe someone who likes Star Wars as nerdy
because so many people enjoy it. One sees Star Wars T-shirts, backpacks and spin-
off shows everywhere. While the term geek is still used to describe television
shows or video games, it no longer has such a sting when its used as an insult. For
instance, Simon said, the word nerd has just sort of lost its punch, its not so much
as a, such a major factor in who people are any more. Because of this un-
harshening, describing a Lord of the Rings fan as automatically wimpy or weak
doesnt quite make sense. However, its not strange to describe Lord of the Rings
as a nerdy trilogy, because the term nerd stuck to the product, rather than the
person. That tradition of popular masculinity and unpopular fantasy stuck to the

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description of the media as geeky, but not the people who consumed the media.
However, people may choose to consume that media specifically because they
consider themselves a geek. The cultural connotations of certain television shows or
movies, such as Star Trek, suggest that geeks flock around what is already known
as geeky.
Members of the Arizona Midnight Channel, a panelist group for local comic
book and anime conventions, struggled to explain why people think of hackers or
science-fiction obsession when they hear geek. Dilan Dean, one of the two
panelists, said, I mean, its used, you hear it more when it comes to like gamers,
anime, nerds, but its definitely used across, everyone can use it (Whalen and
Dean). And thats the real distinctiontoday anyone can use the term nerd to
describe themselves. Someone can describe themselves in passing conversation,
Ive been really getting into comic books lately, Im such a nerd. Or, someone can
use it as a central tenet to their existence, I think, therefore I am nerd.

As the terms nerd and geek lose their negative connotations, everyone

will be able to choose whether they want to use these words to describe themselves.
Socially Awkward

As emphasized in the last section, anyone can be nerd. The term no longer

follows any particular personality traits or preferences. While some literature

indicates that geeks do not function as well socially, thanks to hyper-white speech
patterns or social behavior similar to Aspergers, that really isnt the case. Nerds
come from a variety of personalities and dispositions.

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In Nugents American Nerd, he notes that a large number of computer

programmers in Silicon Valley have some form of disorder on the autism spectrum.
He writes that the nerd traditionally shows poor social skills in depictions by the
media, and this reflects into a socially awkward disorder like Aspergers. The desire
for rule-bound, rational communication is the desire that bonds so many groups we
intuitively think of as nerdy: D&D players, computer programmers, ham-radio
hobbyists, sci-fi fans. And it links them all to people on the autism spectrum, he
writes (142). The disorder represents a way of describing a nerds social struggles.
While my own research is in no way statistical, none of the 20 people I
interviewed for this project struggled to communicate or speak conversationally.
They were all articulate and thoughtful, and several of them refuted the notion that
nerds are socially awkward. Austin Baker, a local graphic designer and nerdy dad,
said socially awkward people will always exist, but that doesnt mean social skills
(or lack thereof) are an essential part to defining geeks. Theres always going to be
people like that, he said. But I dont think its necessary for being a nerd. I think
those people end up being nerdy because they can (Baker). In other words, just
because someone has Aspergers or limited social skills doesnt mean they are
automatically nerdy. Its personal choice and experience that matter to nerddom,
rather than the ability to flirt with a cheerleader.
Mary Bucholtz used linguistic expertise to study high school cliques in the
late 1990s and discover a form of superstandard language among those who
embraced the nerd identity (84). While she at first states that nerds choose their
own identity, that its not an inevitable social death sentence but instead is often a

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purposeful choice that allows those who embrace this identity to reject locally
dominant social norms, she then limits that element of choice to the way nerds
speak (85). By the end of the paper, Bucholtz concludes that the nerdy students at
Bay City High School had rejected the cool way of speaking like African-America
students. Instead, they chose to adopt the language of formal English, avoiding
contractions and speaking in formal, literate tones (93). This form of speaking
indicated an interest in academics and an indifference toward the culture of their
peers.
Since Bucholtz published this paper 14 years ago, much has changed in nerd
culture. A reading in modern context dismisses the idea that a geek might speak in
any special dialect. Since the term geek has expanded to mean just about anyone
or anything that chooses to use it, there is no way to categorize nerd speech. Along
these lines, how can one differentiate a nerd in the Society for Creative Anachronism
who enjoys speaking like a 16th century nobleman from a geek who adopts
leetspeak, the dialogue that arose from Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing
Games like World of Warcraft? Geekdom does not have one set language; instead it
uses hundreds of unique dialects from all walks of life. Like Bucholtz said, a person
chooses to self-describe as a nerd. But she also chooses how to speak.
Techies Versus Fans

Its Thursday in downtown Tempe and the weather is that crisp perfection

one would expect of Arizona on a calm February evening. Behind City Hall, booths
with comic books, cosplayers and steampunk jewelry line a wide walkway. In most
respects, Geeks Night Out 2013 resembles a pop-up comiconit has all the right

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energy, people and merchandise. But theres one exceptionhigh school robotics
teams. The teenagers proudly display their technological creations in an area
sectioned off from the pop culture people. As I walk from one side of Geeks Night
Out to the other, the atmosphere transitions from that of women in skimpy
superhero outfits to young, excited scientists. It feels very much like a culture clash.

Simon said the first year Tempe held Geeks Night Out in 2012, he heard from

other attendees that the organizers had not expected so many fans of pop culture.

They tried to tie it into the Sci-Tech Festival. And they wanted to say like
Hey! Intellectual, you know, like, hey geeks are cool and like you know its
cool to be smart! And then when people came out with like giant like R2D2s
and lightsabers theyre like oh this isnt the crowd that we wanted. (Simon)
By 2013 Geeks Night Out had opened its arms to everyone, but it still felt like

an awkward gap between fan and techie.

Numerous interviewees pointedly brought up their personal distinctions

between technology geeks and pop culture nerds. Some emphasized geeks as the
kings of technology, while others say the term geek only applies to a rabid fan of
pop culture like comic books and sci-fi. Which side of the tech vs. pop culture
spectrum they applied to the word geek did not matter as much as how often these
people felt a need to separate the computer geek from the comic book nerd. It shows
that people often mentally categorize tech and pop culture as two sides of a geeky
spectrum.

Tocci has chapters in his dissertation about both technology nerds and pop

culture geeks, and again suggests that the main distinction between the two is
legitimacy. A modern hegemony has emerged where those who build computers
have gained economic importance and celebrity status. It was the dot-com boom

15

that truly promoted the idea that geeks werent just financially secure, but jet-
setting, extravagant, even kind of cool, Tocci writes (201). As digital technology
rooted itself in the American household, so did the image of the tech-nerd as a hip
millionaire. Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and more recently Mark Zuckerberg have
contributed to this notion and spawned a start-up culture that has glorified Silicon
Valley as an Oz for dreamers and doers.

Ironically, some scholars theorize that the social power of this technology

also spawned much of the initial negativity toward nerds. Researcher Lori Kendall
has written about an American society that socially shunned nerds as a form of
backlash against the influx of digital technology. "If our economic status seems
precariously tied to computers, with others better able to benefit from them, we can
console ourselves with the knowledge that at least we're not a nerd, she writes
(Kendall 521). This innate fear of the emotionless machine leads society to mentally
associate nerds with all that is logical, rather than compassionate. And it is from that
systems-based thinking that the early comparison to people with Aspergers
syndrome arose.

Despite this initial backlash, technology geeks continue to rise in cultural

prominence. Across the Phoenix area, hackerspaces and maker shops have cropped
up in an attempt to attract innovation and entrepreneurship. Communal workspaces
like Gangplank and Heatsync Labs are centered around open warehouse spaces that
flaunt 3D printers and precision laser cutters. And Geeks Night Out celebrates the
engineers, scientists and manufacturers whoboost the local economy. In an article
for the Arizona Republic that I wrote, a spokeswoman for the City of Tempe named

16

Kris Baxter-Ging said about 20 percent of all the jobs in Tempe are technology based
(Huskinson).
And thats why Geeks Night Out seems so different from Phoenix Comicon.
The former celebrates technological progress and economic development, but also
welcomes pop culture fans. The latter emphasizes the pop culture fandom and has a
few panels about science every now and then. Both celebrate nerd culture, but they
do it in very different ways. At both events I noticed hoards of people self-
identifying as nerd and communicating. As indicated at the end of Chapter Three,
such events provide an impetus for nerds to move from separated chunks of fandom
to one collective geekdom.

Apart, technology and pop culture represent two genres of entertainment

and consumerism. But one also cannot function without the other. The latest Star
Trek movie depended tremendously on computers and techie nerds to provide the
digital effects. The iPhone has little value if it cant stream movies and play a
consumers favorite music. In the same way, a technology nerd very often subsists
on pop culture fandoms. While mental separations exist, in reality the two interests
will always overlap.
Creativity

Part of culture, especially in the digital age, is the ability to participate with

writing, music, drawing or, in my case, reporting. Nerd is nothing without fan
creation. Cara Nicole dresses as the Marvel super heroine Powergirl, a practice
called cosplay. She also works as a model, writer, colorist, editor, actress and event
coordinator: So yeah, I pretty much kind of do it all at this point except for

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illustration (Nicole). When I ran into her at Saboten Con, a local anime convention,
she was in her custom-made Pinkie Pie cosplay from the show My Little Pony:
Friendship is Magic. She had sewn shiny pink satin to fit her form and wore pink
boots and fishnet stockings. Nicole said the ability to make nerdy things and share
them is empowering. Creativity in geekdom is all-consuming. This is something that
goes into daily life. I mean you cant just say oh, theres a convention, Im going to go
get this costume. These people spends months, years sometimes, building and
creating their costumes, she said. This passion to make fandom-related materials is
rampant among nerds. In some way, everyone who self identifies as a geek wants to
share their love for nerd culture. Their involvement was crucial to this project
because it indicated an investment in the community.

Anabel Martinez, a local artist who recently ran a Kickstarter campaign for a

male cosplay calendar, said the culture gets so involved in its activities that it
doesnt even realize what its doing. When I told her I liked that she promoted the
community, she reacted with surprise. I never really thought that, I really
appreciate it. Because were so busy making things happen sometimes you know we
dont step back and realize how fortunate we are that we can make these things
happen, she said (A. Martinez). Her passion for what she was doing so engrossed
her that she didnt even realize the value of what she was doing.

Tocci said that creation yields more direct participation in ones nerd

community, thus strengthening the idea that it is a community. Its about having
access to more ways to recognize oneself as a geek in daily life, to celebrate ones
geekiness, and to recognize that sense is shared with others, he writes (378-379).

18

Every person I interviewed was involved in the community with some form of
creativity, from poetry to event planning to cosplay. It pulsed through every booth I
walked by at comicons, every conversation I had with geeky personalities, every
event that Jonathan Simon posted on his Phoenix nerd blog Lightning Octopus. Such
participation spreads the notion of geekdom as an actual culture, rather than a label
for a socially awkward high school student. By creating fan art or cosplay or
literature, a geek moves beyond consumption into active participation.
Zeitgeist

Geekdom has reached its day in the sun. It has gained more

commercialization, popularity and participation than ever before. Bernard Schober,

the local nerd poet, said, People are liking the fact that they can, they can be nerds
and be cool. They can play Dungeons and Dragons, they can watch Doctor Who,
they can watch Star Trek and still get dates and go out and, you know, take
someone to an event like this and be respected (Schober). In the next chapter, Ill
explore this expansion aspect. But in the sense of definition, as nerddom has grown,
the perception of it has also changed. Because of its breadth, the geek image no
longer consists solely of an anti-social teenage boy with acne. All the nerds I
interviewed were from different backgrounds and had no particular personality
traits that made them nerdier, beyond a love for comics, cosplay, sci-fi, board
games or computers.

Nerddom has reached a point where it can be described as a Renaissance

where art is becoming fun and popular and, you know, cool, (Nicole). The word
nerd no longer lurks in the shadows of comic book shops; people don the term

19

proudly to describe themselves and their interests. Because its not about being
unpopular, its actually about being artistic and dedicated and passionate. Beard
quoted an article by the actor Wil Wheaton about motivation fueled by enthusiasm:
And I think, you know what? I think thats a really good summation of what
nerddom is A nerd is being excited to the point of, you know, geeking out or just
spending all your time just studying something or just being comfortable with that
weird thing that youre into, he told me (Beard). Its about having the energy, the
passion and the drive to participate in a larger culture where anyone is welcome.
And by embracing that community, the geeks receive a strong sense of solidarity. In
Phoenix, a host of events, comic book conventions and clubs can provide that unity,
as I will indicate in Chapter Two.
Conclusion

From the socially unskilled poindexter to the hacker in blue jeans, the images

of people as nerds are prolific and constantly evolving. When I asked you to picture
a nerd at the beginning of this chapter, I knew you couldnt actually do itat least in
an all-encompassing, effective way. As Tocci writes, geek cultures, then, represent
great, unwieldy things, (79). The definition of geek orbits around a complex
atmosphere of historical developments, social perceptions and personal freedoms.
One cant pin the meaning of nerd entirely on the Cold War or the personal
computer or a fanatic lust for comic books.

Above all else, the definition of the terms geek and nerd looms upon the

notion of choice. Unlike many other culturesethnic, religious, intellectual, or

otherwisethe acceptance threshold is low. Anyone can say Im a nerd, and feel

20

pride. As nerd culture explodes into the mainstream, its only going to become easier
to join.
CHAPTER TWO
The Explosion of Comicons

Theres always that adage since the early 80s that nerds will take over the world.
Well, look at the world and tell me that it wasnt true. Ryan Cleveland, volunteer
at Phoenix Comicon and San Diego Comic-Con, personal interview

Nerdom is everywhere. Its in our television shows, on our billboards, on our
Facebook walls, on our T-shirts, in our conversations, and on our minds. Bernard
Schober, the organizer behind a nerd poetry slam at Phoenix Comicon (PCC), said
its like a star thats exploding with a very dense core and it kind of pushed out so
the core no longer exists. So like now the matter that was in there is everywhere
(Schober). Several forces are driving that stars expansion. First, major movie
studios in Hollywood have capitalized on a demographic of mid-career adults who
grew up in comic book shops and 1980s arcades. Second, the Internet and social
media offer new ways to spread nerd culture to everybody (but I wont cover this
aspect until Chapter Two). These two catalysts have led to an increase in events that
celebrate the geek way of life: comicons, movie screenings, gaming tournaments and
general get-togethers.

Because of this constant barrage, geek culture has not only entered the

mainstream, but also everyday life. Austin Baker said the nerd community is now
becoming part of our day to day. My kids wont know a life without nerds. Lori
Kendall, the scholar who wrote about general distrust in nerds because they held
power over technology, writes that images of references to nerds are more
prevalent now than ever before (506). Rather than hiding out in comic book shops

21

or pretending to have watched last nights football game at work, geeks can now
proudly flaunt their latest action figure or chat openly about the new Marvel movie.
They are using the new media as a platform for even stronger geek communities.
But this success also follows a history of subjugation, which Ill talk about in the next
section.

In this chapter, I will look at the growing acceptance of nerdom through a

lens of commercialization and comicons. Comic book conventions, physical spaces

intended for geek interaction, introduce the reader to a larger Phoenix nerd
community, leading to this projects final chapter about nerdoms other cause for
growthsocial media.
The Beginning

Of course, before the revolution of the geek chic, nerds had to suffer. They are

the famous victims of the cruel high school jock, and many of my interviewees told
stories about being picked on. Cara Nicole, the woman who now models for a living
in her skin-tight Powergirl costume, originally had been shoved into lockers and got
her head flushed in the toilet. Debbie Brown runs Geek Prom at PCC, a Saturday-
night party at PCC that features live music from geeky bands and raises money for
her nonprofit, Kids Need to Read ("Phoenix Comicon - Geek Prom"). She said her
family didnt exactly embrace her love for Star Wars, so she hid her love for the
geek way of life until high school (Brown). Anabel Martinez, an artist at PCC, said
she had always believed the stereotype that comicons were like a basement
convention for nerds, so she tried to avoid themuntil she became the marketing
director for PCC and made lots of new friends (she left the position in 2010).

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Old negativity lurks in modern trendy nerd culture. Its the idea that nerds as

a culture have suffered and have now defeated their foes by taking pride in what
they do, thus adopting the geek chic. Tocci writes, geeks use terms borrowed from
discourses of oppression because they understand themselves searching for pride in
the face and in the wake of ridicule and shame (176). As a young person living in
the wake of nerdom as a cool, positive way to express oneself, I must remember how
it got there. Twenty years ago, the nerd label was rarely a choice way to describing
oneself. It was a phrase vehemently used to put someone down. As discussed in
Chapter One, Fonzie adopted the term nerd in the television show Happy Days to
denigrate the more studious, uncool characters).1
It is partially because of these tribulations that nerd pride shines so brightly
today. The explosion of comicons, sci-fi movies, video games and geeky T-shirts
shows that many geeks no longer fear or care about harassment.
$$$

While James Camerons films Avatar and Titanic top the highest gross

income for films at the U.S. box office, Marvels The Avengers falls into third place
at $623 million and Batmans saga The Dark Knight, trails behind in fourth at $534
million ("All Time Box Office"). These are blockbusters. Everyone sees them. And

1 While geek doesnt have any specific usage in popular movies or television, it was always geared

toward the bookish and unsocial (Tocci 18). Popular culture doesnt see much use of dork or
dweeb because nerds havent reclaimed these terms. Fan, means a person with devoted interest
to something and it can very easily be used say someone is a fan of the Arizona Diamonbacks baseball
team as well. Geek and nerd are used interchangeably in this project for a reason. Each of my
interviewees provided a differing view on the connotations of the two words. Tocci writes, these
terms have no essential definitions. As will come up again more than once in this dissertation, the
distinctions that people make between these terms are part of the process of defining what it means
to be a geek or nerd for themselves, often serving to compartmentalize the stereotypes people want
to claim from those they would rather do without, (20).

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they also happen to be about superheroes, the imaginary characters of comic books
typically associated with nerds. As discussed in Chapter One, a story about space
travelers or superheroes seems immature, and therefore geeky. Tocci writes:
When this kind of enthusiasm is applied to tinkering and technology, its
considered acceptably productive. When childlike enthusiasm is applied to
activities already associated with childhood, however, it seems to cross the
line between acceptably geek and a little bit too geeky. (301)

Well, not anymore. Harry Potter demonstrated that a kids book about magic can be
a worldwide bestseller, and the Lord of the Rings indicated that wizards and elves
are welcome at the Oscars, writes Tocci (281). The video game industry is even
larger, netting $79 billion worldwide in 2012 (Gartner). Companies have slowly
woken up to the realization that those runty kids who used to hide from the football
players now make $100,000 at engineering jobs. Disposable incomes can be spent
on fan art, on movie tickets, on Lego kits, on whatever stuff takes the purchaser
down memory lane.
Nearly all the people I interviewed were quick to point out this push to cash
out on adult nostalgia. And guess what? Those old nerds now, who were getting
beat up or you know getting good grades and doing these things, now they have
money. And whos buying things? Those nerds, said Cara Nicole, who dresses up as
Powergirl, a Marvel super heroine. Most of these interviewees were in their late 20s
and 30s, having experienced both the hazing of childhood nerdom and the pride of
modern mainstream geekdom.2 I interviewed this age group the most often because

2 Speaking of demographics, all of my interviewees were either Hispanic or Caucasian. Its odd that

none of them were American Asian, since nerd culture is typically associated with that ethnicity. I can
only chalk it up to coincidence. As for the lack of African Americans, several researchers have
discussed a divide between uncool, socially-awkward Asian or white nerds and hip, un-nerdy, and

24

it was the most participatory; they seemed to be the most involved in the culture in
some way, whether that was art or cosplay or paneling. Usually, they did not yet
have children or at least did not start their involvement in the community after
having children. Simon started Lightning Octopus in 2010 before he became a
father, and doesnt update it as regularly now that hes caring for his infant son
(Simon). So usually, people involved did not have to expend time or money on
children or college. So that led to more participation and to more geek items on
display back at the homestead. Ryan Cleveland, a volunteer for Phoenix Comicon
and San Diego Comic-Con, said he owned so many action figures that they out-
valued his guns, cars, and recreational vehicles.
Personally, I see much of this nerdy movement beginning with the
continuation of the Star Wars films in the late 1990s, followed by The Lord of the
Rings films. Thanks to the geeks who developed digital effects and realistic
computer graphics, Yoda was able to fight an epic light saber duel against Count
Dooku in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. Whether or not someone
identified as a nerd, it was cool to see that on the screen and lose oneself in such a
realistic world. Tom Columbus, an artist who was selling nerdy prints at Phoenix
Comicon, describes it like this: But ultimately why wouldnt we? Its fun. Nerd
culture is fun. Its fun to traipse into a dark theater and lose oneself in The
Avengers, but the film isnt fun without a lot of special effects to establish that

virile African Americans. Ron Eglash writes of this underlying distinction: Primitivist racism
operates by making a group of people too concrete and thus closer to naturenot really a culture at
all but rather beings of uncontrolled emotion and direct bodily sensation, rooted in the soil of
sensuality, (52). I realize this is a lot to take in for a footnote, but I consider race and nerd culture its
own can of worms that could be its own thesis!

25

escape from reality. Nerd films are perfectly suited toward an escapism intended for
the theater. But in order to truly experience that escapism, technology had to
establish some semblance of realism in the films. The old Star Trek of the 1970s
required a lot more suspension of disbelief with those cheesy alien costumes, while
Star Trek: Into Darkness introduced its audience to a glimmering, realistic future.
Comicons

And so, as nerdy movies find their way into theaters, comicons, anime cons,

furry cons, science fiction cons and every other convention intended for nerd folk
follow. One of the first conventions in Arizona was Leprecon, a small event that took
place at the Phoenix Quality Inn in 1975 ("LepreCon History"). Centered around
science fiction and fantasy fandoms, this con thats still going today represents the
old world of geekdom. In American Nerd, Benjamin Nugent attended a meeting for
the Los Angeles Science Fiction Society (LASFS) where the audience was mostly men
in their 50s and only two or three teenagers. The people who would have been
voracious readers of sci-fi and fantasy in previous generations are spending their
time in other ways, like playing video games, he writes (167). At the LASFS meeting
the old men discussed a graying of the fandom, Nugent writes. While I
unfortunately did not make it to Leprecon, an informal conversation with its
administrator Donald Jacques at Geeks Night Out 2014, indicates that Phoenix has a
similar legion of old-world nerdom. In this project Im focusing on the new, shiny
aspect of Phoenix nerd culture, the geeks who grew up in the 80s and now work as
mid-career professionals. Events like Leprecon have been around for decades, and
set a rubric for future comicons with a structure of panels, parties and special

26

guests. But today, Leprecon is not what people are talking about. Theres an origin
story buried in the roots of Leprecon, but in this thesis I am taking a snapshot, not a
flashback. So I move on from this background to talk about what nerdom has
becomenot one annual local convention for fans, but a spattering of cons and
events for all fandoms.
Jonathan Simon, who runs a blog about nerdy things in Phoenix called
Lightning Octopus, said, I dont know what it is about Phoenix but we have like a
bazillion nerd conventions throughout the year (Simon). And he is correct. There
were at least 12 nerdy conventions in Phoenix in 2013nearly one every month
from Taiyou Con for anime fans to DinoCon for dinosaur lovers to ZapCon for arcade
nerds. And outside of Phoenix, a geek can travel to Tucson for even more events,
such as a steampunk convention called Wild Wild West Con. Dilan Dean, a member
of the panelist group Arizona Midnight Channel, said he and his friends host panels
about anime at an Arizona convention about every other month (Whalen and Dean).
This swath of weekend conventions for getting ones geek on throughout Arizona
represents a healthy, active geek culture.

Most of these cons do not die off after their first year as one-time flukes.

Conventions in Phoenix have seen huge growth over the past five years. For
example, Arizona Cactus Con, which is now known as Phoenix Comicon, started in
2002 at a Best Western in Ahwatukee with 432 attendees (Squires). By 2010, after
moving to several larger venues, it had finally settled at the Phoenix Convention
Center with an attendance of 13,998, according to Jillian Squires, director of
marketing for PCC. From there, it only became more of a local behemoth (Squires).

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When I attended for the first time in 2013, attendance had shot up to 55,313. That
year, it was the ninth-most-attended comic book convention in the U.S., which I
calculated from a graphic in Publishers Weekly, supplementing it with attendance to
other cons that occurred after its publication (MacDonald).
And its not just the big guys that are growing. LibCon, a tiny event for high
school students, started in 2011 with 90 attendees and by 2013 had reached 200.
Juan Martinez, the programming director for a Phoenix anime convention called
Saboten Con, said, We get a lot of fresh faces, brand new people for either their,
either this is actually their first convention they come to, every year thats growing
(J. Martinez). He adds that the power of word of mouth should never be
underestimated. People attend their first comicon. They have fun. They tell their
friends about it. Their friends attend their first comicon. The cycle repeats. This old-
school form of advertising also supports one of the main arguments in this project
Phoenix nerds want togetherness. So they gain it by inviting each other to
conventions.
When larger conventions like PCC succeed, people feel inspired to plan
smaller events that aim for a more targeted population. For example, as the vice
president of the ASU Harry Potter club, Dumbledores Army, I am currently
developing a comicon at ASU called Sun Devil Fan Fair. After about three years of
growth and success as a campus organization, the president of Dumbledores Army
and I decided that our club should follow in the footsteps of many great events in
Phoenix with its own comicon. As club outreach coordinator, I spent the month of
February 2014 contacting every quirky ASU club I could find, from K-Pop Dance

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Evolution to a local chapter of the Society for Creative Anachronism. As a senior in

college, I could have spent my last months as a student relaxing and hanging out. But
over the years, the president and I began to understand the importance of
friendship, particularly relationships formed around a common interest like the
Harry Potter universe. When everyone joins over one unique bond, it creates a
support system for all the ups and downs of college and life. With Sun Devil Fan Fair,
we want to place the connection that we experienced in Dumbledores Army on a
larger scale. If all goes well, Sun Devil Fan Fair will bring together all the ASU geek
clubs and many ASU nerds. This philosophy extends to most geek events in Phoenix.
Crucial to the nerd community here is the idea of gathering around fandoms to gain
genuine friendships, which I talk about more in the next section.
Way of Life
Attending comicon is about escape. Its about taking a break from the
struggles of everyday life to celebrate the show or book youre passionate about. Its
about making new friends and bonding with old ones. You dont have to worry
about whats going on in your life. Just hang out with your friends and enjoy the
things you love, said Jamie Whalen from the Arizona Midnight Channel (Whalen
and Dean). This weekend escape can deeply embed itself in a nerds life. For the
panelists behind Arizona Midnight Channel, it gives them a chance to share what
they love without judgment. We get to, I guess, dive into our hobbies more with
other people we dont know. But they have the same hobby as well, Whalen adds.
Like I described in the last paragraph, bonding over similar interests is powerful. It
creates a truer level of connection than a simple conversation about the weather.

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For instance, Jeff Moriarty, the person I used in the introduction to this project, said
he believes that most interaction between people is rather pointless (Moriarty).
When I speak with him at Le Grande Orange, he challenges me to list some of my
favorite nerdy media. I stutter out that I love Alan Moores Watchmen. But he wont
accept my proclivity for the graphic novel as an answer. He challenges me to say
why. I liked Doctor Manhattans theories about time. It reminds me of Kurt
Vonneguts theories of time with the alien species in Slaughterhouse Five. Time is
like a mountain range you go and go forward and just look at it holistically and I like
that Doctor Manhattan has like, treats time in the same way, I stammer, trying to at
least make a little sense (Moriarty). Then he explains why he wanted me to stretch
out my response, explaining that nerds have a unique position to bond over specific
interests, which strengthens personal connection.
We could have taken Vonnegut and just talked about him. But Vonneguts a
very mainstream, well-known, I bet far more people in this room know
Vonnegut, than know Watchmen. Or if they do its because they saw the
movie and they didnt get it or whatever and so on. But its a great facilitator
and an interesting way to connect people who may not have anything else in
common. And the things that really define people, who likes hamburgers, you
know? A lot of people. Who likes coffee? (Moriarty)

And thats where the escape at comicon liesin the opportunity to bond
with the community over a piece of media that few people outside nerd culture
would understand. At comicon, the chance to talk about obscure comics or anime or
films is at a geeks fingertips, in conversations with everyone from comic shop
owners to fellow fans waiting in line. The opportunity creates a unique sense of
togethernessbut with a few rifts.

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Comicon functions as its own mini universe. Its kind of like high school.
Everyone has their own cliques. Theres people who are like super loud and really
energetic. Youve got the people who are quiet in the corner. Youve got the kids who
are there just because, they basically want to be the security but theyre not the
security, said Dilan Dean from the Arizona Midnight Channel (Whalen and Dean).
Under this same idea, Tocci said San Diego Comic-Con has been described as Nerd
Prom, because its where all the geeks gather in their own unique community (89).
These descriptions connote the presence of con culture within nerd culture. The
above paragraph emphasized the escape that comicon can offer, and that escape
brings geeks into their own system of order and rules. As emphasized in the first
chapter, personality traits in nerd culture dont follow any particular pattern. A nerd
can be shy, funny, loudit boils down to self-identity. By sticking a bunch of
different people on the convention floor, an independent social ecosystem arises. In
a later section, Ill discuss how some of the fandoms in this ecosystem have
splintered into parts and what some organizers are doing to bring them back
together.
Along these lines, each convention also has its own personality. Whether
thats the flow of people on the convention floor, the way people wait in line for
panels, the amount of people in cosplay or the types of artists who vend there
(professional versus Do-It-Yourself, for example), each event is a unique, fascinating
experience. The attendee organizes her time there around her personal interests. At
Saboten Con, for example, I spent most of my time in the gaming room learning
about roleplaying, because I hadnt seen much anime. But at Phoenix Comicon, I

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spent at least half of my three days there in panels, learning about zombies, Game
of Thrones and The Hobbit. Along these lines, next Ill compare Phoenix Comicon
to San Diego Comic-Con, the granddaddy of all U.S. comic conventions.
Versus

Rather than taking an in-depth look at the colossus that is San Diego Comic-

Con (SDCC), which would require extensive interviews with its organizers and a
dive into its long, 40-year history, I will base my analysis on the experiences of those
who attended it and told me about it. I myself went to SDCC in 2009, and that will
also play a small role in my comparison. Tocci describes it as a vast, geeky bazaar,
a collection of artists and vendors that come together to sell products specifically
geared toward geeks (262). But its more than that. For many, San Diego has become
a way of life. As mentioned above, its been compared to high school prom, Las
Vegas, andmost aptlyBurning Man. A large art and music festival in the middle
of the desert, more than 61,000 people attended Burning Man in 2013. SDCC has
also reached international fame and high attendance, which Ill speak about in more
detail later in the paper. Both events tout the same free, unhinged energy, just
through different forms. (SDCC) has its own sense of social norms and social
acceptances and things to do and things you absolutely do not do, said Debbie
Brown, who runs Geek Prom at PCC (Brown). San Diego has become a beacon of
cultural significance for nerds. And over the years, many people also think it has
grown too big for its britches.
The key difference between San Diego Comic-Con and Phoenix Comicon
(beyond the spelling of comicon,) is commercialization. SDCC has transcended its

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former reputation as a Nerd Prom to become a mass marketing tool (Tocci 89).
With the expansion of geek culture into the mainstream, San Diego Comic-Con has
broadened its programming and therefore sold more stuff. Over the years, as San
Diego Comic-Con attendance rocketed to becoming a sold-out event, movie
executives began to depend on it as a litmus test for the popularity of their films.
The great thing about Comic Con has always been the way it bridges the gap
between fans and prosbut with the sheer amount of showbiz glitz going into the
event now, it's like its own microcosm of L.A., writes Charlie Jane Anders in io9
(Anders). In another article, Alexander Abad-Santos compares it to the Super Bowl:
a football game but it isn't really about football. It's about goofy ads, and half-time
musical acts, an excuse to party, and a promotional bonanza (Abad-Santos). Abad-
Santos points out that some of the headlining entertainment at San Diego didnt
really touch upon the traditional geek spirit; Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2,
American Dad, and The Blacklist, were all panels at SDCC in 2013. Its become a
platform to launch everybodys new TV series, even if they have nothing to do with
the culture at all, Brown said (Brown). Jonathan Simon put it bluntly: Big ads and
big companies (Simon). In other words, its gone beyond what the fandoms love to
what the fandoms will watch and what the fandoms will buy.
Many nerds contend that the point of SDCC is no longer about celebrating
ones geek identity; its about celebrating how much money one will spend on geek
stuff as a consumer. In an online essay titled Its Not You, Its Me The Comic-Con
Break Up, RM Peavy writes that the average Comic-Con attendee spends $2000.
The sooner I leave you, the sooner I will have more money, she writes (Peavy).

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Another blogger budgeted her costs to $1600, putting $100 a day toward
merchandise and the rest to food, hotel and travel (Sills). However, the chance to
spend that money has become ever more slim. San Diego Comic-Con has sold out
every year since 2006, with more than 130,000 people attending in 2012 and in
2013. The quest to obtain access into the con has been likened to fights to the death
in Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games (Peavy). To acquire a membership badge,
hopeful attendees enter a lottery system that may or may not land them access. At
PCC, no one has yet been turned away at the door. Ryan Cleveland, who works for
SDCC and for Phoenix Comicon, said in Phoenix theres lots of room for growth,
while San Diego has been filled to the brim. I feel like that being such an embracing
such a, hey we want our community to grow, unlike most markets where theyre
kind of like, oh we dont want you coming to our convention. Were like, no, the
more the merrier (Peavy). This sense of accepting all geek fandoms with open
arms creates an emphasis on community at PCC, but the following section in this
chapter on splintering will indicate this practice doesnt necessarily create one big
happy family.
Of course, the main draw for San Diego Comic-Con is the chance to interact
with the artists, actors and creative people who make the comic books, movies,
video games, and television shows that nerds love. My friend Modjeska Hutchings,
who is going to art school, cosplayed at SDCC as a character from an upcoming show
on Cartoon Network. The creator of that show noticed her, and she got to hang out
backstage with the crew. Stories like this are not unheard of at San Diego Comic-
Con, though they have become less frequent of late since the explosion in

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attendance. My interviewees were quick to point out that Phoenix Comicon has
grown in part due to showrunner Matt Solbergs smooth maneuvering to land big-
name stars. They went out and they got big names. And because they got big names,
they got a lot more people and theyve continued that tradition, said Andrew
Hopkins, a panelist for PCC (Hopkins). In 2013 Phoenix Comicon reunited the cast of
the sci-fi series Babylon 5; in 2012 it brought William Shatner from the original
Star Trek series; in 2011 attendees saw the creator of Spiderman Stan Lee.
Because like San Diego Comic-Con sells out so fast every year and its become such
a big deal that this is kind of their back-up option, Hopkins said. Because theres
maybe not as many amazing people that you can see, there are a few decent stars
that they cant necessarily see at another con thats near them. And since PCC has
less than half the attendance as San Diego, the chance for a nerd to high-five his idol
comic book writer or television actor greatly increases.
In Phoenix, my interviewees say the emphasis is on nerd community over
commercialism. Director Matt Solberg has focused on the value of bringing nerds
together, rather than their value as consumers. Matt is really trying to keep it as
authentic as he can, but hes a business man, you know. He in it, at the end of the
day, hes in it to make some money. But I do not think it will ever be at the expense
of the fandom and the community, said Brown, the woman behind PCCs geek
prom. Other local conventions follow the same rubric. Greg Fennell, the director of
Saboten Con, said its always been about the fans. Were growing slower because
were not letting the industry control us, but were also being able to keep our
connectivity to the community, he said (Fennell). Tocci writes that comicons

35

function as socially insulated spaces where attendees can escape from the typical
rules dictated by society to a new rule system (77). In a space where dressing as
your favorite comic book character is seen as cool and wearing a plain T-shirt is
lame, this utopian sense of creativity rules. And in the end, it is more about that
foray from the normal than the chance to see Leonard Nemoy or buy a model of the
Millennium Falcon. And at comic book or anime conventions, geeks are all escaping
from normal life together, so it creates a festival atmosphere. They can celebrate
nerdom collectively, though sometimes they dont want to.
Makers, Bronies and Trekkies

While comicons offer geeks the chance to convene and bond over similar

interests, the community might also fragment over certain fandoms. The first
section of this project emphasized that geekdom is a collection of interests and
personality types. On the convention floor, those differences play out into roving
factions of Whovians, Doctor Who fans who may never interact with the old-
school Trekkies, Star Trek fans. Because so many different shows and games can
be considered nerdy, some people might neglect an overall nerd community or
nerd culture for a science fiction culture or a Harry Potter community. For
instance, Phoenix Comicon 2013 offered a plethora of activities: Saturday nights
zombie walk, a weekend-long film festival, the cosplay masquerade, a cartoon-
themed rave, a Doctor Who birthday party. Everyone had a place to go, said
Brown, the planner behind Geek Prom:
They really are trying to embrace the larger fandom as a whole and trying to
give, you know, each individual group something thats going to appeal to
them. You know theres never going to be one thing for everybody but the
fact that you know we dont just have Geek Prom anymore. Theres the

36

zombie walk, theres the masquerade, theres the rave, theres you know, a
bunch of stuff. (Brown)

While many interviewees saw this array of options as a benefit to PCCit draws in
more fansit also keeps everyone locked in their own world.

As nerd culture has expanded into the mainstream, many nerds have reacted

by retreating into their fandoms, said Bob Beard, the researcher writing his
dissertation on nerd culture.
I think as nerd culture is mainstream, then theres going to be all these
different little splinters where its not just you know hey nerd. Youre
diametrically opposed to being popular so were going to lump all of you
nerds into one thing. Well, as you know theyre nerds for everything, you
know, theres bronies and then theres you know, makers, and they dont
have a lot in common. (Beard)

Those bronies, fans of the cartoon television show My Little Pony: Friendship is
Magic, have broken off into their own conventions. So have fans of Star Trek and
fans of Harry Potter. Meanwhile, makers use technology to create whatever they
dream of, combining geeky computer skills with innovative thinkingthey dont
necessarily love pop culture (But it is common for them to be associated with it. See
Chapter One: Techies Versus Fans). Because with the shift of nerds definition from
socially unpopular person to anyone who decides to call themselves a nerd,
subcultures have been arranged on a spectrum of less accepted to more accepted.
To exemplify this fracture, Tocci includes an abridged version of the Geek
Hierarchy in his thesis, with video gamers near the top and furries at the bottom.
This chart represents a society ruled by productive adult interests, he said. Geeks
often have a love of fantasy worlds, but tend to not want to be mistaken for being
unable to tell fantasy from reality, he writes (302). This mental distinction

37

translates into the manly nature of a soldier defeating the enemy in a game like Call
of Duty versus a brony emulating the friendly nature of a cartoon pony. Even nerds
have a way of segregating each other, particularly as the culture expands.

Few events at Phoenix Comicon purposefully attempt to bring together all

factions of nerdomone of them is Phoenix Ultimate Geek Smackdownor PUGS

for short. The man behind it, Jeff Moriarty, is one of the most outspoken people I
interviewed. After a long Friday at PCC, I join a crowd of at least 100 at PUGS to
watch four self-proclaimed nerds awkwardly shuffle to the front of the room and sit
behind tables. Jeff Moriarty introduces the game.

Well heres how this ridiculous thing works. Youre going to see a series of

battles. Fierce, terrible battles where geeks are going to come up here and debate
questions they have not seen before. They are going to see them on these screens at
the same moment that you do. We are going to assign each one of them a side,
Moriarty says that night. A real, ultimate geek should be able to debate it either
way.

Oh, and one more thing.

Because they are getting these things off the cuff, sometimes they get topics

they know nothing about, you are going to see on this stage unbelievable amounts of
bullshit.

And at this point, the audience is psyched beyond belief. I am one of many

nerds clapping, cheering and preparing my vocal chords to cheer on my choice for
who debated which geeky thing better.

38

Round one. Enter contestants Peter Townshend and Jonathan Juliano. The

first question blinks onto two large screens to the left and right of the stage:

Who is the wiser headmaster: Dumbledore or Charles Xavier?

The crowd explodes into guffaws, cheers and rants. Townshend and Juliano

have a combined two minutes to make their points. Each makes an opening
statement. Townshend points out that Xavier selected each student at his School
for Gifted Youngsters personally, while also dealing with the politics of mutant
rights.

This guy has more on his plate than anybody I can think of. And he does it all

from a wheelchair, he finishes.

Juliano responds by noting that Dumbledore deals with the same issues at

Hogwarts, also selecting students personally.

And he does it all while being five times as old as Charles Xavier. At least

lets go by the beard length, he says to many laughs from the audience.

And the debate rages on for several minutes, ending with the point that

Dumbledore never came back from death and Xavier did. Townshend emerges
victorious, advancing to the semi-finals but eventually losing to Shawn Hamilton on
the question: Which is the more valuable book, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
or the Necronomicon?

Eventually Mike DeDelong earns the title of Ultimate Geek against

Hamilton, defeating him on the question: Which is the wiser philosophy? Live Long
and Prosper (from Star Trek) or Be excellent to each other? (from Bill and Teds
Excellent Adventure). He wins because of his argument that Be excellent to each

39

other, represents the spirit of Phoenix Comicon. At that statement his opponent
resigns the debate, and he emerges wielding a trophy that is an amalgam of
Abraham Lincoln, Spock and Obi Wan Kenobi.

While it may seem like a game that pits geeks against each other, PUGS

actually brings everyone together to celebrate the craziness of nerdom, said

Moriarty to me in an interview two months later.
Youve got these little individual groups but the more isolated they become,
the more polarized they become. You know you can get back to that Oh,
youre a fringe, you, youre kind off on your own caring about this topic and
nothing else, versus saying, Hey. Youre just, you know, this is your passion,
thats my passion, we have things in common because we both care about
these things. We have more in common than we have differences. Even
though my thing is Doctor Who and your thing is My Little Pony.
(Moriarty)

The best way to make people connect is by getting them in the same room and

talking about what they love, Moriarty said. He agrees its ironic that at PUGS one of
the best ways to gather people is by making them debate, but the content of the
conversation matters less than the fact that all factions of geekdom are
intermingling. If the event marketed itself by saying, hey, were going to try to bring
everyone together, no one would actually attend, he said. PUGS is reverse
psychology. Because people arent cheering for the faction of fandom they love,
theyre cheering for the nerd who debates it best. The goal in the end, he said, is to,
rather than just splinter into a million pieces be different facets of the same gem
(Moriarty).

Moriarty sees this cross-breeding as the next step for geeks because without

it, nerdom will continue to fragment and break apart as a culture. Conversation
between people becomes more than a chat about the weather or whats on at the

40

moviesit becomes a real incentive for friendship. People need to, you know, in
nerd culture communities, find ways to combine and connect and share what they
love about these things together versus separately, he said (Moriarty). Because, in
the end, a persons passion is beautiful, no matter what it is. And if people have a
chance to realize the value of every fandom, nerds can all appreciate each other a
little more.
More Cons, Stronger Community (Conclusion)

Ten years ago, Phoenix only had three or four small nerd conventions. They

took place at Holiday Inns or Best Westerns and the only people who knew about
them were bergeeks embedded deep in the culture. Everyone else stuck to sports
games, the bar or the zoo for their weekend activities. Sports were kind of always
like the safe thing for guys to talk about at work, said Anabel Martinez, a local artist
who had a booth at PCC. And then you go over a couple years later to the transition
where people talk about the Avengers movie. Today, Phoenix Comicon has become
the trendiest way to kick off the summer. 55,313 people squeezed into the largest
convention space in Arizona last year for PCC, and with Stan Lee booked as a guest
in 2014, even more attendees can be expected. If you look at the last five years, you
know, the momentum is incredible. Theres no reason to believe that Its going to
slow down, said Brown, the organizer behind Geek Prom. She and several other
interviewees listed the growth of cons as one of the main reasons for growth of nerd
culture overall. Beard describes conventions as a gathering space that allows new
perspectives and it allows that fandom and that nerdery to grow (Beard). While
nerd culture exploded with growth, untapped expansion may also lead to a more

41

impersonalized experience at comicon, where fans have less access to key elements
of the event, like panelists or walking space. This growth also spurred a separation
of the fandoms, as discussed in the section above, where people huddled in their
unique space as nerds rather than opening themselves to others.
This explanation of cons as a catalyst for growth also raises a chicken-and-
egg type questiondid the cons grow because the culture grew, or did the culture
grow because the cons grew? The factors of commercialization, comicons, fandom
and culture are so interwoven that nothing stands out as the driving factor. But as
Beard and Moriarty both told me, events like comicon offer a way for geeks to merge
around their interests and make new connections. By fostering this communal spirit
in Phoenix, nerd culture remains strong. When leaders plan events like Phoenix
Ultimate Geek Smackdown, they shun a materialistic need for wealth and opt for a
purer appreciation of fandom itself. Anabel Martinez said, If theres like a marketer
trying to take advantage of a geek community, everybody here is pretty earnest
about it. You can tell if somebody is trying to do an event because they love that
culture, they love that series, they love that fandom, or if somebody just wants in for
the money (A. Martinez). When nerds remain united, our culture is a mighty force
for good in a disjointed, lonely world.
CHAPTER THREE
Local First

One of the things I talked about was the importance of having, if you want people to
really rally behind you, the importance of having a villain. And I kind of pretend that
my villain is, one my villains just boredom, but the other one of my villains is just
sort of the stereotype of phoenix being this culture-less, drab place. Jonathan
Simon, Phoenix nerd blogger, personal interview

42

And so, nerdom finds itself thriving in the sixth-largest city in the United

States. Phoenix is a metropolis divided into tiny pieces, and nerds here must
navigate through large distances, economic struggles and ridiculous summer
weather to gather as a community. Thats been easier in the last ten years thanks to
networks formed on the Internet. Nerds are now able to find their people at the click
of a button.
Community

As I delved deeper into this project about Phoenix nerd culture, I realized
that personal identification as a nerd does not actually have to mean friendship or
physical interaction with other nerds. When Tocci wrote his dissertation, much of
his research depended on Internet conversations via his research blog and
elsewhere:
I wanted (to) make use not just of relatively isolated pockets of highly self-
selected Internet usersmailing lists with users who voluntarily sign up,
massively multiplayer games charging subscription fees, obscure chat rooms
and venues requiring semi-expert knowledge to accessbut also the most
openly accessible and easily stumbled upon areas, scattered across the entire
web. (110)

Toccis wide approach to the digital frontier of geekdom alerted me to my own in-
person approach as a researcher. I found most of my interviewees by walking up to
them at comicons or at certain nerd-oriented events. While Tocci interacted with
nerds both in the physical world and in the depths of Internet forums, I stuck to
people directly involved in events that impacted the Phoenix nerd area. By doing
this, I narrowed the scope of this project and focused on interviewing people more
involved in the community.

43

The last section of Chapter Two illustrates the power of gathering geeks
across fandoms through events like Phoenix Ultimate Geek Smackdown. That spirit
is an essential part of curating nerdom in Phoenix. Because anyone can self-identify
as nerd, thus technically joining nerd culture. If a person watches a Spiderman
movie, she has technically participated in nerd culture. However, she can only join a
nerd community if she remains an active participant, and thats typically done by
showing up at comicon or by flaunting her cosplay at Toy Anxietys yearly Christmas
toy drive. Beard, the researcher writing a dissertation on nerd culture, said that
comicon, brings all these people together around sort of a shared identity where
they can facilitate new connections (Beard). Those physical connections matter to
this project because people unite in a geographic location rather than a non-descript
digital space.
Moriarty from PUGS describes this physical interaction as organized versus
inherent nerdom. A person who loves anime and stays in their basement all day
watching Naruto is inherently geeky. But hes not contributing anything to the
Phoenix nerd community, so hes not in the organized part of nerd culture. For
instance, while growing up, Moriarty said he loved Doctor Who, but he was never
able to find an actual fan club. In the modern expansion of nerd culture, thats easier
to do than ever. Tocci writes that having a geek identity does not necessarily imply
membership or participation in local geek communities, (74). Events have never
been more accessible, so geeks of Phoenix can only be geeks of Phoenix if they go
beyond adopting the nerd identitythey must adopt the identity of their city as
well.

44

But Phoenix Isnt Just a Physical Place Anymore.

The physical realm of the Phoenix geek community could not exist without

the Internet. The World Wide Web boosted the general dissemination of all
information, and therefore nerd culture. The promulgation of information and the
fact that its so accessible makes everybody nerdy because you can deep dive into
any subject you care to, Beard said. Ron Eglash describes nerds as the gatekeepers
of science and technology (49). The Internet was developed by nerds. Everyone uses
the Internet, but the nerds still control it. So the nerdsin a sensecontrol
everyone. Only a geek well-versed in memes knows how to find a funny picture,
caption it in Photoshop or MS Paint and post it on Reddit or Tumblr.

Thanks to the Internet, what used to be fragmented pockets of unpopularity

have united to form a nerd culture thats no longer unpopular. For instance, Debbie
Brown from Phoenix Comicons Geek Prom joined a forum for fans of the sci-fi
television show Firefly, that got her through a difficult divorce. Before the Internet,
she could never have found this kind of fandom-oriented support system. While the
economic import of the Internet has often been proclaimed (with some truth) to
have rescued the image of the geek, the way in which it has helped develop the
collective identity of the geek is to show nerds that they are not alone, Tocci writes
(76). Before, nerds had to discover each other at random in the office or at church,
said Austin Brown, a geek dad. Today, many people discover via forums, websites
and Facebook posts that a friend or acquaintance also loves Star Wars, so its no
longer shameful to be in that fandom.

45

In Phoenix, the gathering of the nerds via the Internet happened on a smaller

scale than the worldwide revolution of geek chic, but it was no less powerful. I
found out about Austin Baker, a geek dad and nerd culture enthusiast, through
Jonathan Simons short-lived podcast about Phoenix geek culture called Electric
Cephalopodcast. Baker grew up in a southeast community about an hour drive
from central Phoenix called Queen Creek, which at the time was more rural
farmlands than suburbs. There was no neighbors, there was nothing to do, I had
video games that I would, like I saved up and I bought myself a Genesis, he said
(Baker). The experience gives him a drastic comparison of his relative isolation as a
nerd to the mass of nerds he found when he joined Twitter in 2007. Being into this
stuff by myself is boring, but like finding commonality to hang out with people is
really crucial to me, he said (Baker). He likes that meeting with others around
subjects like coffee or food or Star Trek, can spur new ways of thinking about
things. But twenty years ago, he would have never found those commonalities
outside church, school or work. Back then, community meant something very
different. And so you would live in the same town and you would go down to
church and you would have all your church friends and so your community was very
tied to important things like your job, church, whatever, he said. Geography
mattered.

Enter social media. It brought a way to connect people over specific, quirky

interests like collecting magnets from Disneyland or riding tandem bicycles. In the
case of Baker, he found his people. And there were lots of them. Thats how that
kind of series of relationships ends up getting built where if someone comments on

46

enough things, like I follow them back or if Ive already met that person I'll follow
them back like and suddenly you now have this connection with somebody youve
never met and you have some similar ideas, he said (Baker). After a Twitter chat, he
met Jeff Moriarty of PUGS for weekly coffee and they eventually started a Phoenix
Friday Coffee event that still happens every week. His Internet interactions naturally
transitioned into physical interactions. Debbie Brown, who joined the Firefly fan
forum during her divorce, said the strongest friendships always eventually progress
into the physical realm. The reason why we are so close is because eventually we
meet in real life, she said (Brown). These real-world connections indicate the
power of social mediaPhoenix geekdom is formed as much at comicon as it is on
Twitter when people talk about their comicon experience.

And thats how it worked with the Phoenix nerd community. As people

discovered each other for their nerdy interests on the Internet, they formulated
reasons to meet up. Additionally, events like Phoenix Comicon used the Internet as a
marketing tool to draw geeks together. Rather than posting a flyer at a bar for
comicon, the organizers were able to move beyond general interest into niche
digital subcommunities and blogs.
Of course, the Internet can only go so far, said Greg Fennell, the founder and
director of Saboten Con. Relationships and everything today are so much digitized
that theyre missing the physical interaction that you can get by going to your local
anime clubs and going to your local cosplay groups, he said (Fennell). Because
when everyone is interconnected, but they never actually meet face-to-face, it
creates a unique form of isolation. In Alone Together, social psychologist Sherry

47

Turkle writes about a society fragmented by computers and robotics. Many have
left behind the religious and civic associations that once bound us together. To those
who have lost a sense of physical connection, connectivity suggests that you make
your own page, your own place, she writes (157). By meeting in-person, Phoenix
nerds can move beyond the screen to feel empowered in the real world.
Phoenix Sprawl

Social media revolutionized geekdom in the Phoenix area. It brought a

scattered collection of suburbs into one collective force. It united people over their
interest in video games, rather than their religion or affiliated sports team. Its
absolutely vital that we have the social Internet networks set up because man, if not,
youre going to have somebody thats out in Apache Junction thats never going to
probably ever set foot in downtown Phoenix, said Debbie Brown of PCCs Geek
Prom. The sprawl of displaced neighborhoods in Phoenix is similar to the
disconnected fandoms I discussed in Chapter Two. Just like a Star Trek fan might
stick to people who know Star Trek and no one else, a person in Ahwatukee might
stay in the Ahwatukee community. But social medias arrival provided a platform for
cross-pollination between all the suburbs of the Phoenix area.

Tocci writes that geeks need socially insulated spaces to truly feel a sense

of community. Not everyone on the train or at the office is going to share your geek
identity, and even if they do, they may not show it, he writes (76). At a place like
comicon, nerds escape from people who might judge them to be with their people,
and geek out with ease, as discussed in Chapter Two. In the Phoenix area, there is no
specific place where all the geeks hang out. There are more than five comic book

48

shops, two stores for action figure collectors and numerous places that embrace the
geek spirit, like Filmbar and its monthy Japanese film series. Outside of these brick-
and-mortar businesses, Phoenix nerds typically find each other through events.
They create those insulated spaces on a weekly basis, and they have social media to
thank for it.
Twitter, Facebook and blogs promote opportunities for geeks to gather
beyond the convention floor. On his blog, Jonathan Simon posts a weekly list of three
or four geek-relevant weekend activities going on around town. He said he actually
prefers featuring events on his blog because he likes the idea of connecting geeks,
rather than profiling them. I was more interested in community and connecting and
getting out and having people meet other people rather than just highlighting a few
key players in the area (Simon). Social media communication allows people to
leave their designated suburb in the sprawl for a nerd event. This furthers their
ability to express personal identification as a nerd, because instead of going to a
convention every other month, they have a chance to be among geeks every single
weekend. Anabel Martinez said she is staggered by the amount of geek events in
Phoenix: Here they have like almost too much. Like I cant do everything there is
here, theres no way (A. Martinez). From geeky concerts to steampunk festivals,
Phoenix is so large and diverse that it offers a range of events for every kind of nerd.
Simon brings them all together in one place, with his blog garnering attendance and
interest from people in every corner of the city. Thanks to the weekly efforts of
Simon and event planners, the community remains strong, despite how widespread
it actually is.

49

The Quest for Cultural Identity

Nerd culture can find itself built upon the youth of overall Phoenix culture. In
1870, the Salt River Valley had a population of 240 (Rowe). Things happened all
around the region that later would become the state of Arizona. But the center
remained almost inert, writes Richard Nilsen in a series of articles about the
development of the Phoenix area (Explorers Swarmed Southwest, Except Empty
Valley). He also quotes a congressional report that read, The region is all together
valueless. After entering it, there is nothing to do but leave ("Phoenix Had Humble
Start"). But some people never left. Even after Arizona became a state and Phoenix
its capitol in 1912, the transformation from a tiny group of villages to a modern
metropolis didnt really pick up until the mid-20th century (Valley Hits Boom, Bust
Between Wars). In 1902, Willis Carrier patented the modern air conditioner, which
made the southwest that much more livable (Who Made America? Willis Carrier).
World War II brought military training centers to Phoenix, and therefore people
(War Changes the Valley). According to an article on PBS, During the Fifties, 20
million Americans left the nation's aging cities and relocated to new houses in the
suburbs, fulfilling their dreams of home ownership and establishing social
connections with new neighbors ("Generation T. Tupperware!"). In Phoenix, that
real estate explosion was incredible. Nilsen writes of the citys rapid expansion:
By 1955, it was 29 square miles, with a population of 156,000. Just five years
later, it filled 187 square miles with 439,000 people. This was more than
sprawl, it was exponential: It was like the quantum leap of an electron from a
lower shell to a higher one in an atom. Pop. "Phoenix Growth Explosive after
the War"

The sprawl had arrived.

50

This (incredibly) condensed history represents the relatively recent

development of Phoenix as a city. Phoenix didnt really begin its journey toward
becoming a metropolis until the real estate boom of the 1950s. Compared to the
Harlem Renaissance of New York or the French quarter of New Orleans, Phoenix is a
cultural infant. With the exception of cowboy, Hispanic and Native American
influences, Arizonas capital has been described as a spattering of suburbiait
hasnt had as much time to establish a genuine cultural footprint. While
southwestern life can invoke images of John Wayne swaggering around in cowboy
boots or margaritas in excess or handmade Navajo bolo ties, what it really comes
down to in Phoenix is cars. Lots and lots of cars. Taz Loomans, founder of a
sustainability blog called Blooming Rock, writes that Phoenix and its surrounding
suburbs simply dont provide an urban or hip infrastructure: I dont expect to see
people when I step out the door. I dont expect there to be musicians on the street or
panhandlers or passersby like I see and experience here in Portland. I expect only to
see other cars going to and fro from the vantage point of my own car (Loomans). If
there is a culture in Phoenix, some would argue its confined to cars and stucco
homeowners associations.
But thanks to social media and comicons, nerd culture has bridged the people
of these suburbs into one collective whole. Interviewees say geekdom works well in
Phoenix specifically because the city is young and unestablished. Cara Nicole, who
cosplays as Powergirl with the Arizona Avengers, said the future lies open here:
Phoenix is the city that hasnt grown up. It doesnt know what it wants to be when
it grows up. A lot of the other cities are established, theyve been this way for so

51

long (Nicole). Because there arent any cultural gatekeepers for Phoenix, nerds here
have no inhibitions. Bernard Schober, the man behind Phoenix Comicons Geek
Poetry Slam, said Phoenix geeks drive much of the local indie culture. Were
importing nerd culture, or were exporting nerd culture to other scenes, he said
(Schober). The community can be shaped around any culture powerful and
passionate enough to make an impact. And nerd culture, a synthesis of creativity,
performance and self-expression, has a pretty good chance.
Epic Fail, Great Success

Physical serendipity is difficult in Phoenix. Its a place where someone

driving 40 miles-an-hour has two or three seconds to notice a business on the street
to their right or left. In walking cities like Portland or San Francisco, its much easier
to gawk around and spot a shop that interests you. Perhaps thats why so many
small businesses succumb to the mighty chain giants that dominate our suburbs. Of
course a business can use social media to reach potential customers, but so does
every other hobby shop, collectible card store and restaurant in the area. In Bird on
Fire, Andrew Ross describes Phoenix as a mecca for chain stores and corporate
franchises, eagerly courted by the real-estate industry, (99). People here shop at
the stores they know, the ones with big parking lots. Ross goes on to use a quote
from Kimber Lanning, a small business owner in the downtown Phoenix arts
district, They think that the nice new shiny shopping centers with Targets and
Applebees and Walmarts are the way to go, snorts Lanning, (99). These big-name
companies, the sprawl, and a general habit of shopping at these places do not make

52

life easy for a small business ownerparticularly someone who tries to sell art or
play independent films.
On the website for Evermore Nevermore, the about page reads: After a
trend-setting two year run, the family owned & operated shop had to close its doors
in December of 2011 due to the poor economy and recession, but many speculate
that this was a cover-up to distract attention from their secret mission to save the
world from the 2012 Mayan apocalypse (utilizing the time-canal portal hidden in
their building's basement), (About the EN Network"). Two years later, this Mesa
comic book and art shop is still famous in the Phoenix nerd community for its quirky
products and interesting events. After the announcement of its closure, Jonathan
Simon wrote, The strange little store in Downtown Mesa brought so much
personality to the place I cant even put it into words. A lot of local businesses put on
fun events for me to share, but Evermore Nevermore always gave me events to that
were easy to write about. Different and interesting things. Ill miss them tons,
(Simon, Evermore Nevermore Is Closing [Bummer]). After Evermore Nevermore
opened in Mesa, nerdy businesses like The Royale and Gotham City Comics followed.
But after only six months, The Royale, which showed independent films and hosted
geek events like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle pizza party, followed Evermore
Nevermore in its demise (Leatherman). Gotham City Comics is the only survivor.
Everything just sort of crashed within like sixth months, Simon said (Simon). Local
nerds who had dreamed of selling comics and introducing people to quirky films fell
victim to the Recession.

But then they reemerged, ready for the next battle.

53

Andrea Beesley-Brown, the owner of The Royale, partnered with Filmbar in

downtown Phoenix to host four films a month under certain themes. For instance,
March 2014 was the Mystery March Film Series, and featured a screening of Stanley
Kubricks The Shining, with tricycle races ("The Shining with Tricycle Races!
Mystery March Film Series). The event sold out, as have many others from her film
series in past months. As for Bob and Debbie Leeper, the couple behind Evermore
Nevermore, they transferred all the resources they had gathered as a brick-and-
mortar store into a website for connecting the alternative art scene in Phoenix, from
steampunk to local fantasy authors. I determined it was more economic than
enthusiasm, Simon said. There was kind of a shift from brick-and-mortar to
events, just like for fun, light and quick and less of a financial commitment (Simon).
So while several comic book shops and gaming stores call Phoenix home, the city
draws much of its nerd power not from the act of buying and selling stuff, but by
bringing people together at comicons and miscellaneous events. As indicated in
Chapter Two, the best comicons emphasize the community over the commercial for
the same reasonin the end, its what keeps the culture thriving.

When the Recession destroyed those businesses in downtown Mesa, it

brought out the resiliency of the community. No matter how tough economics got,
those nerdy dreamers clawed their way out of failure into something new. Anabel
Martinez, an artist with a booth at Phoenix Comicon, said:
Any new event Ive done, Ive never been worried about like, Is it gonna be a
success or not, because people are not afraid of failure here. Here even if
an event only gets handful of people, like downtown Mesa. Maybe theyll only
get a few hundred out versus a thousand for a second Friday night out but its
just, theyre really excited to do it and you can tell with that energy, theyre
not afraid of failure. They learn from every event, and are willing to do it

54

again and try to make it better. So theres really not any quitters here, and I
think thats a really good attitude too. (A. Martinez)

That attitude has taken Phoenix geeks through a whirlwind of naysayers, empty
wallets and poor attendance. But instead of packing up, instead of letting nerd
culture drift to the wayside, they have fought their fears. They have overcome every
setback to express their fandom for movies or artwork or comic books without
hesitation. Phoenix nerds have realized that success is impossible without a little
failure.
Conclusion

In Phoenix, nerds have found each other. Twenty years ago, they dwelled in

tiny pockets, gathering at pre-Internet conventions like Leprecon, which has been
around for nearly 40 years and typically draws 400 people or less (Leprecon
History). The Internet served as a catalyst for connection. Through Twitter,
Facebook and forums, geeks gathered en force, and garnered recruits. A person in
Gilbert can now drive across town to Glendale for a retro-arcade night. The Phoenix
area became a hub for geeks from every corner. Phoenix Comicon exploded.
Jonathan Simon started his blog. A community arose. And those friendships formed
around fandoms, rather than ones address, were more powerful than ever before.
CONCLUSION

On any typical Friday night, you wont find me trolling the bars or hitting up

the movies or dolling up for a party. You will find me in jeans and a T-shirt, playing
wizard chess. Or getting sorted in to Hufflepuff. Or, later in the evening, cussing
dramatically at my poor luck in a game of Monopoly. This has been the entirety of

55

my social college experience for the past three years. And Ive loved every single one
of those Friday nights with my Harry Potter club, Dumbledores Army.

Because before that, I spent my freshman year of college alone and confused.

I simply assumed the people who lived on my floor would become my friendsthey
were also in the honors college and journalism majors, after all. Not so. The situation
was like what Moriarty described in Chapter Two of this projecta sense of dull,
rather meaningless conversations. I felt like no one there truly understood me,
clicked with me in a way that was instant magic. But when I saw a flyer for the Yule
Ballthat all changed. The first DA meeting I attended was the last meeting that
school yearsthe Yule Balla get-together where students dressed like Harry
Potter characters and danced to fan music called wizard rock. It wasnt that I was a
huge Harry Potter fan that made the night so special, though that certainly helped.
It was that as I awkwardly stood in the corner of that small ballroom, it was
amazingly easy to strike up conversation with people. What had felt like some
desperate charade to connect in all those months before felt nothing like this. It was
the kind of genuine, pure excitement and humor that hadnt personally experienced
since high school. Simply putit was magical.

So today I dont feel any desire to do the social things many college students

do on a Friday night. Board games and laughter are enough.

And that experience, in a larger sense, is what the Phoenix nerd community is

ideally about. Its a journey of ones own personal identity that cant get there
without the help of some friends. When choosing to identify as a nerd, whether
thats because one loves Doctor Who or because one can put together a

56

microprocessor or because comicons are a needed escape, one must also choose
ones nerdy friends. In Phoenix, bonds are formed despite a number of challenges
fandom splintering, geographic sprawl, and financial struggles. Passion has defeated
these foes to emerge with the power of togetherness. The Phoenix nerd community
has responded to the explosion of nerd culture into the mainstream by emphasizing
community over commercialization. The genuine nature of this push for stronger
human connection, for a real conversation, for a sense of understanding, is what this
thesis tried to capture. As the definition and meaning of geekdom continue to
evolve, it is community and togetherness that will keep the concept of this culture
alive.

57







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