Date of Award

Spring 4-14-2023

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

English

First Advisor

Dr. Alex Blazer

Second Advisor

Dr. Jennifer Flaherty

Third Advisor

Dr. Mary Magoulick

Abstract

My thesis discusses why the banning of sexually explicit content is occurring in fandom spaces, who is trying to ban this content, and why it should matter to people both inside and outside of fandom. This thesis looks at these answers within the framework of feminism and fandom culture. When fanfiction is considered to be literature, it is easy to see why fanfiction matters. This is especially true when the authors of fanfiction are primarily women and are told that their content might be harmful to others through the reasoning that pornography is anti-feminist. I wanted to explore why these ideas are false and how actually banning sexually explicit content is not only harmful to fanfiction authors but also to marginalized groups as a whole. I argue that pornographic fanfiction should not be censored as it gives a voice to marginalized communities.

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