Bruce Banner Can Be an Asshole”
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REBECCA SUTHERLAND BORAH 14. “BRUCE BANNER CAN BE AN ASSHOLE” Using a FanFic to Break Down Privilege and Introduce Service-Learning Concepts In primary school, when we first begin to write creatively and make up stories of our own, one of the rules authority figures often impress upon us is not to copy or imitate too closely what others have created before us. Mimesis as a teaching technique was not in vogue. Whether it’s fixing holes in a plot from a book or television show or inserting ourselves as a bright-eyed “Mary Sue” or “Marty Sam” among the characters we love in a movie franchise, young writers who “borrow too much” are usually discouraged by writing teachers, scoffed at by snobby peers, or are told by the academy to avoid using what is “not yours” or face academic discipline for plagiarizing or maybe even a cease and desist order from an author. Therefore, it’s not a huge surprise to find that the academic view of “fan fiction” often relegates it to the shady underbelly of creative writing that is way too friendly with much-despised genre fiction for it to be practiced much less discussed except as part of social, cultural, or media studies. Even worse, as Grady (2016) notes in her recent Vox article, “Why We’re Terrified of Fanfiction,” is the misconception that it’s written by “oversexed teenaged girls” and is “porny and borderline illiterate…, which is wrong for moral, aesthetic, and legal reasons” (Grady, All of these arguments, para. 3). Whatever it is, the message from traditional authorities is clear: it’s certainly not literature and should not be in a classroom! However, the nature of fanfiction as subversive, often questioning accepted norms, makes it an accessible and useful tool for engaging students in critical thinking both in and outside the academy. Introducing it in my Composition with Service Learning classroom has helped students engage in challenging discussions about race, class, and privilege that we otherwise might have glossed over or ignored. Furthermore, the particular piece I used introduces students to what Gottlieb and Robinson (2006) describe in their Practical Guide for Integrating Civic Responsibility into the Curriculum as “active participation in the public life of a community in an informed, committed, and constructive manner, with a focus on the common good” (p. 16). WHAT IS THIS STUFF? Fanfiction, also known as fan fiction, fanfic, FF, or just fic, can loosely be defined as any text that is inspired by or builds upon the original work of another. In its current form, fanfiction often uses characters or settings (even universes) found in M.A. Fabrizi (Ed.), Fantasy Literature, 217–230. © 2016 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved. BORAH published novels, television shows, or films, but may also focus on musicians, celebrities, athletes, and other real people or historical figures. Fanfiction is written for other fans without the goal of monetary gain—peer acknowledgement and reactions are usually enough reward for the author. According to the Fanlore Wiki (2012), “It is most commonly produced within the context of a fannish community and can be shared online such as in archives or in print such as in zines [fan- produced collections] …. Writing fanfiction is an extremely widespread fannish activity; millions of stories have been written, and thousands more are written daily” (Fanlore Wiki, 2012). Surprisingly for some, Virgil, Chaucer, and Shakespeare all used preexisting material and their works “built on other stories, extending, extending, and sometimes subverting them” (Fanlore Wiki, 2012) while “derivative works, such as Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea, a prequel/retelling of the events of Jane Eyre from the perspective of Rochester's mad wife, can be even more readily recognized as a form of fanfiction, as can works in shared universes such as Lovecraft’s Chthulu mythos” notes HubPages writer Kerryg (2011) in her article “The Basics of Fanfiction” (Kerryg, 2011). One might even argue that Cervantes would not have finished the second volume of Don Quixote if the publication of the fannish counterfeit second book by an unknown author had not spurred him to complete his masterpiece. Fanfiction has been around since the first storyteller shared a tale and the next individual retold it and added a few flourishes. Writing about characters’ relationships or “shipping,” is among the most popular types of fanfiction. Pellegrini (2016) writes in her HubPages article, “Is Fan-Fiction Wrong?” that “Fan fiction stories can come in all different styles, genres—and ratings. Many stories are ‘shipping’ stories, about pairing characters together romantically, whether or not those characters ‘officially’ became involved or not” (Pellegrini, 2016, A brief introduction, para. 8). Another popular subgenre is “slash” fiction in which “straight characters are instead portrayed as gay or bisexual and in relationships with each other” (Pellegrini, 2016, A brief introduction, para. 9). Shipping fanfiction runs the gamut from “fluffy” G-rated romances that might lead up to a chaste kiss to mature pieces with very explicit sex scenes, rough language, sexual “kinks”, and violence that are rated NC-17. Intrigued, I began to explore some of the fanfic on An Archive of Our Own (AO3), I stumbled across The Hollow Men by an author calling herself “Lettered,” which featured Bruce Banner (the Hulk) and Steve Rogers (Captain America). The summary reads, “Steve goes to Uganda, ostensibly to fetch Bruce, who doesn’t want to join the Avengers. Steve tries to figure out how to do the right thing; they both try to find their place in the world” (Lettered, 2012), but what actually happens is a critical exploration of multiple types of privilege and power and the troubling nature of first-world responsibility. It’s also a meditation on civic responsibility and our mixed motives for wanting (or not wanting) to help others on their own terms rather than ours. The author also touches on the evolving concept of masculinity and the role violence and its threat plays in an unstable environment. The author weaves in the themes of action vs. inaction from the T.S. Elliot poem referenced in the title and does more than just chronicle Steve’s journey to 218 .