FanLIS2025
General Call for Presentations
As FanLIS reaches its fifth anniversary, this year’s online symposium will reflect on this nascent field, and how it has progressed over those five years. We are therefore calling for presentations that focus on all aspects of the intersection between fandom and Library and Information Science.
In 2019, when the FanLIS project was first started, we could never have imagined how much this interdisciplinary field would grow in the following years. During this time, we have seen the creation of fanworks grow in new and perhaps unexpected ways – from fanbinding, which marked a renaissance of fanfiction in physical, print form; to generative AI, which has affected how fanworks are produced and commodified and disseminated in digital spaces. Our presenters have shared their work on a diverse range of topics, such as the role archiving plays in fansubbing and fan-translations; citation practices in fan podcasts; cosplay as a part of fan journalism; and even AO3-style academic repositories.
From this diverse scope it is clear that there is much that this field still has to offer. To mark the fifth anniversary of the FanLIS symposium, we are putting out a general call for presentations on all aspects on the intersection between fandom and Library and Information Science. As we are particularly interested in hearing from fan voices, this call includes reports on activities undertaken by fans themselves, such as collaborative fanzine projects; fan-led archival or preservation or documentation efforts; online fanfiction reading groups; or any other fan-led work to create, organise, share and/or preserve fanworks. We would also particularly like to hear from librarians, curators and archivists who have been working with the fans on collecting and caring for fanworks, as well developing best practice alongside the fan community.
Proposals on, though not limited to, the following topics are welcome:
- Fanbinding
- Fanzines, and other forms of amateur, small press, or self-publishing
- Fan journalism
- Fandom and copyright
- Fan-tagging and metadata
- Fan information behaviour and information seeking
- Documentation of fan (sub)cultures
- Preservation of fanworks and/or fan collections (both physical and digital)
- Fandom and AI
- Fandom and virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR)
- Fandom, sensory perception and embodiment
- Fandom and immersive experiences
- Podfic, fan podcasts, fanfilm, memes, and other audiovisual fanworks
- Fandom and social media
- Collaborations between fans and memory institutions (i.e. libraries, archives, museums and galleries).
- Libraries and memory institutions as depicted in cult media franchises (e.g. books, comics, videogames, movies, etc.).
- The use of fandom and fanworks in library instruction
- Etc.!
We accept proposals from librarians, archivists, curators, students and fans, as well as scholars. We will also accept proposals for presentations in non-traditional formats (although please bear in mind that FanLIS is a virtual symposium, and that the presentation will need to be delivered online, regardless of format).
Please send your 500 word proposals to both Ludi Price at Ludovica.Price@city.ac.uk and Lyn Robinson at lynrobinson@ntlworld.com by midnight on 28 February 2025.
Authors of successful proposals will be notified by 7 March 2025. The symposium will provisionally take place online on May 22nd 2025. Timings will be set to local British Summer Time (BST).
Authors of accepted papers will be invited to publish their work in a special volume of Proceedings from the Document Academy (open access). A $10 fee will be required to contribute towards DOI registration.
Please send any queries to Ludovica.Price@city.ac.uk.
