“A fandom is a subculture composed of fans characterized by a

feeling of empathy and camaraderie with others who share a

common interest.”

Music Fan culture

➔ 2010 One direction twitter- tumblr and instagram added to this

➔ online fandoms, alternatively referred to as stan culture, are
primarily frequented by teen girls or queer individuals.
➔ Stan culture within music drives music sales through the increase
of chart wars.
➔ stan culture isn't entirely positive: bullying, harassment, and
invasion of privacy
➔ Harry Styles answered, “How can you say young girls don’t get it?
They’re our future. Our future doctors, lawyers, mothers,
presidents, they kind of keep the world going” (Billboard).
➔ Plaster a three-foot-tall poster of Connor McDavid in a room full of
Oilers merch and it’s no big deal. A girl does the same with a Harry
Styles poster in a room full of One Direction merch and suddenly it’s
cringy or creepy.
➔ Urban Dictionary defines fandom as “An innocent word used for
describing a cult of sleep-deprived people who obsess over one or
multiple comics, books, tv shows, movies, video games, etc.”
➔ One of the biggest benefits of being in fandom is a sense of
belonging
➔ 2017 article from the American Counseling Association, pop culture
and fandom can be used to: enhance client-counselor
communication and the therapeutic relationship, help create deeper
meanings, foster a more profound understanding of one’s self and
relationships, improve social skills, help clients have a better
comprehension of therapeutic concepts, and improve goal setting.
➔ As hordes of young womendressed in pink descended on theaters to
watch Barbie, they catapulted the movie into the highest grossing
film of the year in the U.S.
➔ Small businesses on Etsy that sell silver, chrome and sequins saw
their sales skyrocket. After beyonce asked fans to come to her
concert dressed in silver
➔ fans paid homage to Taylor Swift's lyrics — "So make the friendship
bracelets" — by hand making them for the Eras tour and posting
photos on social media. Michaels Stores experienced a 300% jump in
 sales of beads and jewelry in the days leading up to the concert at
her tour stops, with a dramatic 500% increase in Pennsylvania when
she performed in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.
➔ Taylor’s show in Glendale, Ariz., generated more revenue for the city's
businesses than the 2023 Super Bowl, which was held in the same
stadium.
➔ The US travel organisation said Swifties spend $1,300 on average per
person in local economies on travel, hotel stays, food, as well as
merchandise and costumes.
➔ When Swift started dating Kansas City Chiefs football star Travis
Kelce, his games suddenly started seeing a massive increase in
viewership. Notably, it spiked 53% among teen girls age 12-17 when
Swift showed up to one of the games
➔ StubHub, the ticket-resale platform, "has seen a nearly three-fold
increase in ticket sales and ticket searches for all Chiefs home games
for the rest of the season."
➔ Universities from Harvard to University of Texas are offering courses
on Swift. UC Berkeley has an entrepreneurship class at its business
school and University of Delaware an economics course based on her
career.
➔ Chilean President Gabriel Boric, a self-proclaimed Swiftie, shared in a
YouTube video that he reached out to Swift. "I wrote to her not too long ago,
let's see if she responds, so that one day she can include us in her Latin
America tour."
➔ Beyoncé's tour has been devoted to honoring Black and LGBTQ+
communities. It has inspired attendees to shop at Black-owned companies,
giving them a "Beyoncé bump."
➔ According to The New York Times, Beyoncé 's tour generated an estimated
$4.5 billion for the American economy, about as much as the 2008
Olympics did for Beijing.

Football/ sport fans

➔ 42% of men in the U.S. would describe themselves as avid sports

fans, but this number dropped to 15% within women
 ➔ Sports culture offers an avenue for the “boys will be boys”
➔ Fanaticism within sports has a storied history of hegemonic
masculinity and physical chaos. Meanwhile, stan culture is
somehow touted as more detrimental to society.
➔ In my [authors] experience, sports fans constantly accuse women of
being ‘posers’ and subject women fans to incessant questions to
prove themselves as ‘true fans.’
➔ ‘puck bunny,’ a derogatory term for a girl who only watches hockey
to pursue or crush on the players
➔ Argentinian footballer Diego Maradona once claimed football “isn’t a
game nor a sport; it’s a religion.”
➔ supporter groups are official and affiliated with the club while others
are fully independent, but they all have the same aim—to bring
together a group of people
➔ Fans are beginning to support superstar players as they move
around from club to club rather than sticking with a team – and this
threatens the very foundations of the sport.
➔ 12 million football lovers in South Korea, nearly a quarter of the
population, have picked Tottenham due to heung-min-song
➔ Your childhood walls with One Direction posters are no different
from having jerseys, posters of your favorite players on the wall, or
even a shrine to your own former football career
➔ Men love to talk about their favorite football teams, with no one
telling them to not waste their time on something so frivolous. I
don’t see any difference between stalking Taylor’s Instagram to see
which album you think is next and trying to predict the NFL draft.
➔ shared dysphoric group experiences such as relegation, or a bitter
derby loss, lead to bonding with other group members
➔ there are loads of football fans that follow teams from different
towns/cities to where they are from. In Britain, we call these fans
“Glory-Hunters”
➔

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