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An Ethnography of Harry Potter Fans

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An Ethnography of Harry Potter Fans UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY Trust, Friendship and Hogwarts Houses: An Ethnography of Harry Potter Fans by Heather Victoria Dunphy A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY CALGARY, ALBERTA September 2011 © Heather Victoria Dunphy 2011 Library and Archives Bibliotheque et 1*1 Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de I'edition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington OttawaONK1A0N4 Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Canada Canada Your file Votre refdrence ISBN: 978-0-494-81404-8 Our file Notre r6f6rence ISBN: 978-0-494-81404-8 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non­ L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library and permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par I'lnternet, preter, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans le loan, distribute and sell theses monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, sur worldwide, for commercial or non­ support microforme, papier, electronique et/ou commercial purposes, in microform, autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in this et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. Ni thesis. Neither the thesis nor la these ni des extraits substantiels de celle-ci substantial extracts from it may be ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement printed or otherwise reproduced reproduits sans son autorisation. without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a la loi canadienne sur la Privacy Act some supporting forms protection de la vie privee, quelques may have been removed from this formulaires secondaires ont ete enleves de thesis. cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires aient inclus dans in the document page count, their la pagination, il n'y aura aucun contenu removal does not represent any loss manquant. of content from the thesis. 1+1 Canada Abstract Millions of people worldwide have enjoyed reading the Harry Potter books and watching the film adaptations. Some enjoyed the series so much they actively participate with the text and interact with others sharing their mutual interest. This thesis explores the community of Harry Potter fans and how cross-cutting ties contribute to group cohesion. It also explores the pervasive sense of trust within the Harry Potter fandom and how trust contributes to group membership and fandom unity. I draw on participant observation and qualitative interview data collected during my fieldwork with Harry Potter fans during the summer of 2010.1 argue that the Harry Potter fans have memberships in overlapping subgroups. These subgroups help build a unified community that is similar to the close-knit community that Harry Potter experiences at Hogwarts and yet is at odds with the social structure of the non-fandom lives of fans. 11 Acknowledgements Thank you to everyone who participated in my research. I am forever grateful for their time, generosity, stories, and goodwill. Thank you to Dr. Charles Mather who supervised me throughout the thesis process, challenged me to think deeper about my data, and calmed my fears of complete inadequacy. Thank you to Dr. Anne Irwin who inspired me to pursue my Master's degree in the first place and was always a friendly listener. Thank you to Dr. Mary Pavelka, Dr. Doyle Hatt and Dr. Erin Gibbs van Brunschot for their valuable feedback. Thank you to the Department of Anthropology for all of their contributions to my Master's program. Thank you to Paul Bridger, Matthew Esau, Juli Finlay, Ian MacNaira and Sarah Sandham for your support and friendship and for coffee runs to Mac Hall. Thank you to Geoffrey Cartwright who listened to my ruminations with attentiveness and patience. Finally thank you to my parents for being incredibly supportive throughout my university career. I would not be here without them. The research for this thesis was supported by the Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canadian Graduate Scholarship from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Canada, a graduate scholarship from the Department of Anthropology, University of Calgary, and a Queen Elizabeth Graduate Research Grant from the Government of Alberta. in Dedication To all Harry Potter fans who told me of their fan experiences And invited me along on their adventures. May Harry Potter be the boy who lived on. IV Table of Contents Introduction 1 A History of Magic - Ethnographic Background 9 i) Harry's Journey to Bookshelves and Backpacks 9 ii) Canon Synopsis 15 iii) Literature Review 20 iv) Theoretical Background on Fandom 23 v) Anthropological Theory 27 vi) Conclusion 34 Accio Ethnographic Data!: Methods for Conducting my Fieldwork 36 i. The Anthropologist as a Research Instrument 37 ii. Caput Draconis: Access 42 iii. Ethics 43 iv. Sampling 44 v. Recruitment 45 vi. Data Collection Methods 47 Participant Observation 47 Social Diaries 53 Focus Group 55 Interviews 56 Autoethnography 61 vii. Analysis 62 Life at Hogwarts: Results and Discussion 65 I. Quantitative/Qualitative Summary of Themes and Demographic Background 70 Demographic Background 72 II. Trust 75 iii. Activities 85 IV. Sorting 95 How to Sort 97 House Identity 102 Competition between Houses 104 Impermanence 109 In the Common Room Ill V. Famous Fans 114 Fans Without Houses 117 Famous Fan Benefits 118 Personal, Competent and Legitimate Authority 121 Infamous Fans 129 VI. Friendship 131 Connecting Online 136 VII. Conclusions 139 v Conclusion 142 Sources Cited 151 Appendices 162 Appendix B: Analysis of Word Count Comparison Chart 163 i. Interview Informants 163 ii. Themes 164 Appendix C: Word Frequency Report from Max QDA (Top 100 Words) 168 Appendix D: Informant Demographics 170 vi Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?- Albus Dumbledore - J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, p. 579) Vll 1 Introduction It was 10:30 p.m. on March 31, 2009 and I was just returning home from a long day of study at the university. My parents had been calling me repeatedly all evening asking me when I would be getting home. When I finally walked through the front door, I saw an owl sitting on my kitchen counter. A plastic owl, left on my doorstep two years before, with an RSVP to my Harry Potter party attached to its leg. The owl, normally stashed in my basement, now sat on the counter with an envelope at its feet. It was addressed to me and postmarked from Edinburgh, Scotland; my parents figured it was a response to my letter from J. K. Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter novels. I had sent the letter three months earlier in a big manila envelope, addressed to J. K. Rowling and in care of her publishers in London, England. Inside was a small scrapbook made of brown paper bags and a three- page letter thanking J. K. Rowling for writing Harry's story. The paper-bag scrapbook included pockets full of pictures of my brother and me as we grew up reading the Harry Potter books and a few questions about the Harry Potter series. In my letter, I thanked her and I explained why I was so grateful for the Harry Potter series. I wrote, One reason that the Harry Potter series means so much to me is my younger brother Alex and I would sit and talk for hours about the future books, hypothesizing about what certain things meant and sitting together and reading off the same book. When we were younger, we would dress up in old Halloween costumes, pull out our parents University math textbooks, and run around the house with chopsticks trying to discover if our dog was in fact an animagus.1 We even made up Harry Potter identities: Alex's name was Fabian and my name was Marrastella. While 1 Animagus: A witch or wizard who transforms into an animal. 2 a part of me cringes with embarrassment that you now know this awkward fact about me, I look back on those days fondly and I think that the Harry Potter series kept my brother and I close throughout our adolescence. No matter how bad our bickering would get, it could easily be resolved with an in-depth discussion of the seventh horcrux. I had worked on the scrapbook and the letter for two years before I felt satisfied and mailed it off. Three months later, I received a reply. Immediately I called my brother, Alex, in Montreal and instructed him to log on to iChat, and over an Internet video conference my family opened the envelope and read the letter together. "Dear Heather, Firstly, you should know what an extraordinary thing you achieved because for years now my postbag has been so immense that I rarely get to see the happy letters. I have to prioritise, so it is the letters of fans with serious problems that are placed in front of me every week, and it is they who receive personal replies. Every so often, one of the girls who handle my mail gently remind me that most of the letters do not concern illness, bereavement or other life catastrophes... But your letter was so very beautiful, that my dear, trusted P.A., Fiddy, said, "You HAVE to see this", and if I tell you that the actual letter meant even more to me than the exquisite book you made, you can perhaps understand how much I loved it.
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