For every new hit artist or song, big movie release or book award, a new fandom group is born. Justin Bieber’s most popular fan, Avalanna Routh captured all of America with her love for the teen pop sensation. She battled an incurable cancer and was taken to heaven at the young age of 6. “My angel” Bieber called her after her passing, according to New York’s Daily News. Routh, like many Bieber fans, passionately loved the singer. This created an entity of screaming girls, inspired kids, and a family of Beliebers that are generically known as a fandom.

Fandom is a term used to refer to a subculture composed of fans characterized by a feeling of sympathy and camaraderie with others who share a common interest, according to princeton.edu. The term fandom is officially given when there’s a significant enough following for a person or creation.

History

Shall one compare fandoms to modern nerdom? Well, they could, but fandoms have developed since their sciencey and myster-based origins.

According to wired.com, the very first modern fandom was considered to be Sherlock Holmes. Some of the oldest fanfiction was first written on Sherlock as far back as 1887.

“I’ve always liked the original Sherlock Holmes stories, and when I saw there was a modern adaptation I was very excited,” junior Caitrin Mills said.

Western fanbases generally tended to originate around science fiction and fantasy genres. The science fiction fandom dates back to the 1930’s with the first World Science Fiction Convention held in 1939. One of the oldest and strongest science fiction fan bases are “trekkies,” fans of the 1966’s T.V. show “Star Trek” and everything that followed it.

But even before “Star Trek,” “Doctor Who” was first aired in 1963.“Doctor Who” holds the Guinness World Record for longest running science fiction show in the world.

Shortly after their creation, science fiction gave birth to media fandoms around the 1970’s which focused on the relationships between characters within T.V. and movie media franchises, according to Fan Fiction and Fan Communities in the Age of the Internet.

Around the same time as media fandoms, anime (Japanese animation) and manga (Japanese comic books) fandom set sail in Japan. Manga was introduced in America when fans began bringing the imported “Japanese comic books”  to their science fiction conventions, according to “A Preliminary History of American Anime Fandom.” Before licensing in the U.S., fans would leak subtitled copies to friends in the community, directly starting fansubs.

“Anime was the first fandom I had ever become involved with, and it’s kind of just stuck with me. I love being able to see the cultures of another country, especially one that is connected to my heritage,” freshman Bailey Ramirez said.

From humble roots among “sherlockians” and sci-fi flip-outs, fandoms were created. Since Sherlock Holmes, various new creations and people have gained unique followings to set them apart.

Books and comics 

Some of the modern fandoms originated from books series such as Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, The Hunger Games and Twilight. As their fame grew, these novels became movies and other merchandise to please the growing audiences.

Harry Potter is the most searched-for subject for fanfictions on the web, according to Gordon Hurd’s Yahoo! buzz log. To most people this isn’t a big surprise after recalling the “Pottermania”that swept the nation after each book release. Pottermania is an unofficial term describing the popularity the books had then influenced the self-named “Potterheads” around 1999, according to the Chicago Sun Times.

“What’s not to love [about Harry Potter]?  I love that it promotes the idea that we are all capable of great things if we just believe- in ourselves, in our friends and in the power of good. When my family is waiting at restaurants we often play Harry Potter trivia games together.  As much as I loved reading the books myself, I have enjoyed sharing them with my kids even more,” English teacher Jennifer Sayasane said.

Alongside Harry Potter sits the The Lord of the Rings fans, or “Ringers.”

“How it’s created is just magnificent. Tolkien had created an enitrely new universe when he created The Lord of the Rings,” junior Michelle Schneider said.

More recently though, the two fandoms that have surged like a typhoon are The Hunger Games’ “Tributes” and Twilight’s “Twihards.”

Twilight’s mystic love triangle was a great topic of debate and focus for many fans, which kept a lot of young teens hooked.

“I love Twilight because it represents a world that’s worth fighting for. Compared to other sets of series, it’s got a perfect balance of love, nature, action and mystery,” junior Lenora Murphy said.

While the supernatural romance kept Twihards on their toes, The Hunger Games swept in with a violent post-apocalyptic world and an enjoyable read in 2008.

“When I was in seventh grade and I didn’t have anything to read, my friends were all talking about The Hunger Games and I was like ‘well I don’t really want to read that.’ My aunt had given it to me, and I didn’t know if I was going  to like it because I don’t like the futuristic kinds of settings. But my friend said it wasn’t like that at all and she forced me to read it. So I started reading it and then I fell in love with it. I loved how different it was; usually the story plots are all the same, but this one was so different. I just loved Katniss; she wasn’t a whiny girl. If I was in the situation Katniss was in I would be like her 100 percent,” sophomore Sabrina Massa said.

With both similarities and differences to literature, comic books also have large followings which can be most easily seen in the superhero and “Avenger” fandoms.

“I grew up watching Batman, my mother liked Batman, so I’ve just always loved all the Batman movies and the symbol. I have like 20 Batman items: clothes cups, a necklace, a tattoo, keys, everything. The best thing about being a Batman fan is it’s what I’m known for, like everyone knows I love Batman and they give me Batman stuff everywhere I go,” senior Azalea “Merk” Wilkerson said.

Comic stars aren’t limited to just paper. A new fandom that has recently went viral is the Homestuck fandom, centered around a webcomic written and illustrated by Andrew Hussie. Many people flock to mspaintadventures.com to read about John Egbert, his friends and an alien race inside a videogame known as “trolls.”

“The thing that makes Homestuck stick out from anything I’ve seen before is the trolls and the powers they have. I was John Egbert for Halloween and I made my first Homestuck original character,” junior Sabrina Watts said.

Senior Brandon Lewkowich introduced Watts to Homestuck a year ago.

“Homestuck just sticks out to me. [There are] a lot of cool characters, lots of action, comic relief, and complexity,” Lewkowich said.

Whether these fandoms will continue on forever is still an unknown factor, but it can be easily said that each has left its mark. People have enjoyed partaking in the excitement of the things they grow fond of.

“Fandom is less like being in love than like being in love with love,” American author and journalist Michael Joseph-Gross said.

T.V. shows and movies 

At the center of media fandoms sit the ones that develop from T.V. shows and movies. With media fandoms, fans are pulled along with the storyline while experiencing the “feels” that the different character interactions bring. Often these interactions bring sadness or frustration to viewers.

“Fandom, after all, is born of a balance between fascination and frustration: if media content didn’t fascinate us, there would be no desire to engage with it; but if it didn’t frustrate us on some level, there would be no drive to rewrite or remake it,” American media scholar Henry Jenkins said.

“Supernatural,” a paranormal drama following two Winchester brothers as they hunt down different monsters, is known for the overwhelming emotions it causes.

““Supernatural” is one of those shows that will give the fans what they want, but then they’ll take it way by either killing someone off or changing things dramatically. I’ve cried a minimum of seven thousand times while following this show,” junior Rachel Benson said.

Despite the tears and frustrations, this show has a whopping 12.6 million likes on Facebook and new fans pop up every day.

“After seeing the “Supernatural” fandom on social media websites like Facebook and Tumblr, I got really interested and eventually began watching. There’s a lot to love about the show; I like it because it offers something a lot of other television shows don’t. It took the aspects I liked about school, the history of religion, and it focuses on everything supernatural in the least tacky way. And it doesn’t hurt that there are several extremely attractive men,” Benson said.

Other fandoms of T.V. shows that are popular “Gleeks,” or “Glee” fans, the fans of “Spongebob” called the “Goofy Goobers,” the “Bronies and Pegasisters” that follow the show “My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic,” and the “Breaking Bad” following.

In the movie industry there have also been movie releases that have hit it big, but none quite as large as “Star Wars.” The first movie was release on May 25, 1977 and was followed by two sequels that became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, according to wikipedia.org.

“I would say the trilogy has a solid story with excellent characters as well as solid visual effects for the time that still hold up today. The positives of the original trilogy far outshine the few negatives,” senior Alex Speckman said.

With an ever changing technological world, it’s hard for old movies or shows to keep popular, but a rare few do manage to transcend time.

Music 

It’s not hard to see why some musical artist’s followings are considered fandoms when looking at artists like Justin Bieber, One Direction, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift and Miley Cyrus. Lady Gaga boasts a proud 60.6 million likes on her Facebook page while Justin Bieber comes just under with 57.5 million, proving their fandoms to be some of the largest ever seen on social media.

Lady Gaga rose to full stature with her 2009 extended play The Fame Monster which affectionately titled her fans “Little Monsters.” Much like Lady Gaga, Katy Perry froze her name as one today’s favorite pop artists with her 2010 record Teenage Dream. Both Katy Perry and Lady Gaga have stolen some hit songs since, but their names have faded from the tabloids in trade of boy group One Direction and Disney-star remade Miley Cyrus.

One Direction, an English-Irish London based pop band, has sung their way to girl’s hearts since they signed with Syco Records in 2010. This group, consisting of five fine young men, and their “Directioners” have clashed heavily against existing heartthrob Justin Bieber and his “Beliebers.” The question of whether one fandom will slide over the other remains unanswered, due to the new craze over Miley Cyrus.

Miley Cyrus, after leaving “Hannah Montana” for the adult world, divulged in a series of controversial things, the most notable being her VMA performance. Despite everything, she gained her followers the “Smilers.”

“I’d say Miley is perfection. I was team “Hannah Montana” all the way. I feel like I grew up with her; we both went and found ourselves, she’s just doing it more publicly. I knew [her adult change] was coming based on all the stuff she had been doing after “Hannah Montana” so I was just looking forward to it. Once it happened, like the haircut and everything, I was just like yes. I love everything she does; I think it’s crazy,” Wilkerson said.

If anyone finds themselves not relating to a fandom, they might be a fan of these artists without knowing. Wherever one may be, fandoms can be the knot tying people together.

“Fandoms are very important to me, but what I love about them is that in a fandom it doesn’t matter who you are or where you’re from; what matters is that you all like this thing and that’s what unites you. I really like fandoms; they’ve helped me out a lot,” junior Caitrin Mills said.