ࡱ> @ hbjbjFF ,,G NNNNNNNb&(&(&(8^(<(bJWj:):)P)P)P)+*+*+*VVVVVVV$XR[VN87+*+*8787VNNP)P)WGGG87B NP)NP)VG87VGGMT|NNUP).) 0}8X&(zD~TUW0JWT[E[$UbbNNNN[NU0+* K.G=1\3+*+*+*VVbb &(FXbb&( Angela Thomas University of Sydney 26 March 2005 Fictional Blogging and the Narrative Identities of Adolescent Girls Abstract: This paper explores the emergence of fictional blogging such as blog novels and the diaries of fictional characters as a new form of narrative construction. A typology of blog fiction is first presented to outline the scope of this emergent genre. The paper then introduces a case study of two fictional diaries kept by adolescent girls who use the diaries as one of the means to co-construct and add depth to their crossover and alternate universe fan fiction based on the fantasy worlds of Middle Earth and Star Wars. The case study examines the range of discursive and social practices used by the girls in their collaborative narratives using a combination of narrative theory and post-structural feminist theory. The paper also explores the ways in which these practices embedded in fiction also reflect aspects of the girls real identities. Introduction: Fictional Blogs Fictional blogs have been lauded by news journalists as a hot new literary trend that has revolutionised publishing (Faleiro, online). Blog fiction can be defined as any form of narrative that is written and published through a blog, livejournal or other similar online web journal. According to Faleiro, for authors of blog fiction, the blogosphere thus acts as a cocoon; a space where writers feel appreciated and encouraged, and can identify and define their skills (online). Blog fiction is a way for budding authors to experiment with their style, find their own narrative voice, and workshop their ideas with the possibilities of audience feedback. To date there have been a number of blogs which have been published in the mainstream, some of them non-fiction (such as Rebeccas Pocket), some fiction (John Scalzis Agent to the Stars), and others whose real/fiction status is ambiguous and contested, such as the Belle de Jour (a blog about a London callgirl). To further understand this phenomenon, I have developed a typography of blog fiction as represented in figure 1. I have started by making a clear distinction between what I have called serialised fiction, and what I would classify as blog fiction. In serialised fiction, an author or authors publish a chapter or part of a story they are writing on a regular basis on a blog. For these authors, the blog is simply a publication device, and could in effect be exchanged for any other form. Serialised fiction is not something new, and exists in a range of media forms, such as newspapers, magazines and television. I want to argue that blog fiction as a genre should be defined as that fiction which is produced where an author or authors have used a blog as a writing device, using all of the affordances of the blogging or journaling software, such as hyperlinks, graphics, and the commenting system. These authors are experimenting and manipulating the software to exploit it for their writing purposes, and in this way are creating a genre which has both continuities and disruptions with other narrative genres. Their innovative play with the medium is creating a narrative, which at its best is multimodal, hypertextual, episodic, serialised and interactive. The most common form of blog fiction is a chronicle of the adventures of one or more people told in first person diary style. This seems to suit the journaling software and is congruent with other uses of blogs, which include chronicling the thoughts and ideas about news, pop culture, research, and so on across time. The personalised narrative relates well to readers who are accustomed to reading blogs, as they feel invited into the writers world and enjoy returning each day to find out what has happened to the person. The Glass House is an excellent example of blog fiction which manipulates the blogging software for all its affordances, thereby creating a narrative which is characterised by the use of multimodal, hypertextual, episodic, serialised and interactive features. In the Glass House, the reader gets to see inside the life and mind of James. And James is invisible. In the first entry, the reader is give an overview of the story: Im James. If you arent already in my circle of unusuals, heres whats important: 1. Im invisible. I mean this literally. Its not a metaphor; its not a bitch about my social life. I mean that light does not reflect off of my body, nor things under my influence. 2. Most of my friends are stranger than me. Thats how it goes. I know two telepaths. My best friends a gay telekinetic. My housemates unstuck in time. My girlfriend (I think its safe to call her that)warps spacetime. And those are just some of the people whose faces I know. Ive got weirder acquaintances online, though some of them of course I just dont believe. 3. We, ahem, fight crime. Sometimes. To be fair, sometimes we commit crime, though none of the really bad ones so far. And sometimes we use our power just to get the good seats at the movies. There are consequences, of course. Inquiries. Enemies. Temptations of power. Ill talk about those. But its the day-to-day stuff youll hear about most. Few things are really ordinary when you cant order a burger at McDonalds without spooking people.This is not some superpower I gained from a comic book genesis story. Nothing radioactive bit me. I was born this way. I cant turn it off. (James, online) Typology of Blog Fiction Serialised Fiction -which uses the blog or journals as a means of publishing writing (Entia)Blog Fiction - which uses the blog as a writing device, taking into account and manipulating various or all of the features of a blog: hyperlinks, images etcContained Story the world of the story is contained within the blog itself (The Glass House)Partial Story the world of the story is only partially represented through the blog, and is attached to a forum or other community, often a fan fiction community Interactive role-playing -this interactive blogging resembles role-playing games but there are some sets of blogs which link to the roleplaying forum as part of the storytelling (Providence)Character diary - blogs or journals which are told from a characters perspective, used to either create back story or to integrate within fiction or non-fiction from outside the blogosphere Fictional source (Buffy the Slayer)Non Fiction source: (Bloggus Caesari)Commercial blogs Morris Telford: the blog (Adventure Diary by BBC) Barbies Blog (Mattel)Real Blog, Fictional Characters - includes fictional narrative segments throughout the blog Manolos Shoe Blog Figure 1: Typology of blog fiction The writer, (James) uses standard literary devices such as flashbacks and allusions to explain and suggest the state of his current life (such as the hilarious line: invisible people should not work with hand tools). James also directly addresses the reader at points in the narrative (Imagine, unknown reader, that you were possessed with the miraculous power to make people happy), making meta-fictive comments as well as instructing the reader to be patient with his storytelling. He also includes out of character comments in paretheses occasionally to explain or apologise for being disrupted in the middle of his writing. The characters are fleshed out and real, they yell at each other over mundane things yet truly care for each other despite, or maybe because of, each other's 'unusual' qualities. Readers quickly fall in love with James during his successive hilarious entries, from scaring a young boy on a bus, to playing mind tricks on a group of 14 year old girls as they attempt to perform a Wiccan ritual during a sleepover party. However what also makes the writing distinctive as well as incredibly amusing is that he uses the commenting system of the blog to leave fictional comments by his friends and this not only exploits the potential of blogging for this purpose to its fullest, but it cleverly adds another layer to the narrative. Each of the fictional commenters adopts a particular style also, and the repetition of this style constructs an image of their personae. And when real people leave comments or questions about the story or seeming incongruences in the story, James weaves the answer or explanation into a later post. Sometimes in his posts, James directly talks to one of his friends (To Dana: No, Im not going to be on IM), and as the narrative progresses the 'blog'-ness of it begins to emerge more, with the use of hyperlinks to songes, wikipedia, poetry, books he is reading, news items and even to the posts of other bloggers. James becomes more playful with the genre as he progresses too, including email excerpts, movie reviews, his own poetry, chat transcipts, and images. We are also privy to the occasional guest posts by his (fictional) girlfriend Callie. The exploitation and manipluation of the blog features in this blog fiction is playful and innovative, and defines a standard for blog fiction. Another type of blog fiction I have identified in the typology is one where only a partial part of the world of the story is represented in the blog. In some instances, groups of writers define a story world together and then individually write concurrent blogs from the perspective of each of the characters in that world. This idea is articulated at the Blogfic forum, by Jack, who explains: You can have multiple characters, each with their own blogs, creating this intertwined story with plenty of mystery, cliffhangers, and plot twists. With every new post, the story progresses, and even the most mundane entries develop the characters. The authors become actors, reading what the others write and then adapting the story accordingly. Romance. Suspense. Comedy. You name it. Its part creative writing, part blogging, and part role-playing. (Jack, online) This concept is popular in the fanfiction writing community, and there are a number of role-playing / fanfiction-style LiveJournals, where writers (often younger writers) blog as fictional characters. From the fanfiction community of Buffy the Vampire Slayer for example, various young writers are keeping journals in role as the characters Buffy, Giles, Xander, Willow, Dawn and Clem (see associated URLs below). Similarly, there are groups of journals for the characters in Charmed (i.e. Cole Turner), and for the TV show Providence, which also has an associated website and role-playing forum. It is this form of fictional blogging or diarising for the purpose of writing fan fiction, that is the focus of study in this paper. Fan Fiction The origins of fanfiction can be traced back to the 1930s pulp magazine Fanzines and enjoyed a surge in the late 1960s with the popularity of Star Trek (Jenkins, Textual Poachers). Since then, according to Black, it is an element of popular culture that is ever growing in popularity as new technologies enable native and non-native speaking fans from all over the globe to meet online to share, critique, and build upon each others fictions (1). Borrowing settings, plots, characters and ideas from all forms of media and popular culture, fans weave together new tales, sometimes within the accepted canon (the real works from which they are borrowing), sometimes blending several ideas from different sources (i.e. Star Wars meets Middle Earth) together in a type of fiction called Crossovers, and sometimes imagining new possibilities for additional characters, different histories or different settings to build on existing stories, called Alternative Universe fiction. With the flourishing of fan sites online, the number of fan fiction sites has become prolific with over thousands of sites dedicated to the writing of fan fiction borrowing from such diverse sources as Harry Potter, Anime cartoons and Lord of the Rings (to name just a few). Academic attention is now being focused on fan fiction, with Henry Jenkins leading some of the foremost debate about its value for the development of childrens writing. His observation that, not everything that kids learn from popular culture is bad for them: some of the best writing instruction takes place outside the classroom (Jenkins, Why Heather Can Write), sparked a furor in the US, and an internet buzz of memetic proportion on websites all over. Jenkins observed that through posting fan fiction online and receiving critical feedback from peers, many young people, particularly female adolescents, were gaining considerable insight into the writing process. Another of Jenkins claims was that the fans should be considered active designers and transformers of content whereby they draw upon the canon, or literate texts that are available resources and then manipulate them and integrate them with their own resources, knowledge, backgrounds and identities to construct something new. In further explicating some of the literacy skills developed by fanfic writers, Lewis discusses the value of pop culture in providing a rich scaffold for childrens writing. She claims, What fan fiction offers to these young writers is a great, existing storyline; interesting, three-dimensional characters that have already been developed; and a wealth of back story to both pull from and write about. The inexperienced author doesnt have to spend all his or her time developing something original, but instead can focus on the actual skill of writing. It allows young authors to practice their craft without expending huge amounts of time and energy developing something original. As they build their writing muscles, their writing improves and they tend to stray farther and farther from the source material. (Lewis, 3) If we accept these two ideas then, we are able to re-conceptualise an image of young fanfic writers without the stigma associated with Jenkins use of de Certeaus term poacher (Textual Poachers) and instead attributed with the notion that they are active manipulators and designers of original texts, using given cultural artifacts as a scaffold and launching point from which to develop considerable and worthwhile originality. The Case Study The case study involves two adolescent girls who I met through part of a larger study about childrens identity construction online. The girls, Tiana and Jandalf, are both Canadian, aged 14 and 17 at the time of data collection. Data collected included: blog / livejournal entries, electronic interviews (both synchronous via the palace and asynchronous via my blog), and their individual and co-written fanfiction texts. I analysed the data using a combination of narrative theory and post-structural feminist theory. My particular focus is the ways in which they construct their feminine identities. The fan-fiction that the girls co-write together is a form of crossover fan fiction they combine the worlds of Star Wars and Middle Earth as well as alternative universes to develop their plots. The girls role-play both synchronously (through yahoo instant messenger) and asynchronously (through their role-playing forum, Yoda Clones) to create the basis for their fanfiction, then one of them will usually rewrite those transcripts into a single fanfiction text to post it at fanfiction.com in order to get feedback and a wider readership. In 2004 however, both girls decided to start a livejournal and a blog for their central character for the purposes of exploring and developing their character and enhancing their fanfiction writing through better characterization. In an article about the benefits of fictional blogging for teens, Silvester of the e-zine, About, claimed, This is a great way to tell stories, and to get your stories out there to a wide readership. It also seems to me to be a great way to explore characters. Even if you can't make a publishable novel out of a weblog, writing one from the point of view of a character would really let you get into that character's head. Then it would be even easier to use the character in other forms of fiction. (Silvester, online) In addition to getting inside a characters head, and creating back story for fan fiction writing, I will argue that these particular online journals are also a means of exploring and constructing the self, and that the girls in the case study are authoring versions of themselves as they write in role. The narrative and fiction serves as a safe distancing mechanism to explore feelings and experiences of adolescence that were either difficult or unexplored through their real selves. Fictional Blogging as an Identity Workshop Cyberspace has been lauded as opening up new and liberating spaces for adults: to explore aspects of identity (Turkle), to become empowered by affiliating themselves with world wide organizations, and to gain the strength and knowledge for political activism to bring about change in society (Wakeford; Willson; Wood; Wolff). In considering identity from these perspectives, such uses of cyberspace are also thought to have been a catalyst for challenging the artificial boundaries of the subject as defined by dominant cultures (Shaw; Stone). I would argue that it doesnt take grand involvements in political activism to challenge the artificial boundaries of the subject. Nor does it take adult participation in global affiliations. No. It simply takes two young girls with a passion for writing. In this final part of the paper I want to closely examine the ways in which Tiana and Jandalf are challenging the boundaries of the subject. In doing this, I want to first briefly discuss the concept of identity. I have argued previously (Thomas) for a theorisation of identity as a blend between the self as a social being, the self as experienced phenomenologically, and the self as a subject of the discourses of language and power. I have argued that when considering identity in, around and on the screen, that we should carefully attend to psychoanalytic theory as it applies to visual and film culture, using understandings drawn from Hall, Mulvey, and Riviere. By doing so, we can consider how the nature of viewing oneself acting inside the screen might create a disjunction, which blurs the boundaries between on and off screen. Further to this, it is necessary to rethink the notion that cyberspace is a disembodied space, since the lived experience of participating in virtual worlds becomes an embodied phenomenological experience. Additionally, Butlers and others theories about performativity and how gender may be formed in virtual contexts also influences our thoughts about identity as it performed. Butler understands gender (and in turn other identities) not as a result of who people (already) are but a result of, among other things, the way they talk and what they do (Cameron). From a Lacanian perspective, identity is also intimately connected to unconscious desire, which can be manifested through both the body and through discourse. I will return to these ideas in my discussion below. A common practice by fan fiction writers is to insert versions of themselves into their characters, which is known variously as fusing identities, hybrid identities, or creating a Mary Sue character (Black). Tiana and Jandalf both openly state that their characters are very much adaptations of their own identities, made all the stronger through both the role-playing, which relies upon a considerable degree of instinctuality, and the livejournals, which allow a more introspective reflection into ways in which their characters might be facing issues and angst-ridden insecurities similar to what they are facing in their real lives. The fusion of identity can be observed in this comment by Jandalf, as she describes the characteristics that her real self and her fictional character share in common as reflected through her livejournal entries: I hate it when people, especially children, are pulled into situations they are undeserving of I get mad, but I often try to hide personal feelings. In her journal entry recounting a Jedi mission to CorSec, Jandalf wrote, You got angry, but you hid it. You weren't so much maddened by the though of him getting away as what it would do to all those kids he'd taken into his business. Similarly, in nominating her favourite livejournal entry, Jandalf chose an entry in which she and her Jedi Master, Master Elechi, avoided the crowds in the Coruscant fete day celebrations: Master Elachi doesn't really like Fete Day all that much. Sure, it's a holiday celebration, and there's a bunch of festival activities all over Coruscant (even in this stuffy old Temple), but...this is definitely something we have in common, if nothing else. We despise commercialism. Rather than commune with everyone else in one of the Temple's mezzanines, we found an isolated balcony. It was beautiful, really. Jandalfs rationale for her choice was that she herself hated commericialism, and could inject a persuasive element into her writing, with the intention of arguing a point and influencing readers to enjoy things in their pristine condition as much as she does. Tiana discussed with me the ways in which her character deals with adolescent issues such as growing up and peer pressure and showed me a poem she wrote in her journal that exmplified this. A closer linguistic analysis of this poem reveals how Tianas language choices vividly construct the frustrations and angst experienced by her character and in turn, her real self. Tiana explained to me that the nature of the poem had to do with what her character was going through, in fact describing it as an angst-drama-type poem. Calling I'm stuck within a tangled web of mist and betrayal, Looking in a mirror of me, I wonder of this portayal. Who is this shadow that I see, This isn't how this has to be... Standing here, I wonder how to take this, No longer can I see myself in happiness or bliss. Once upon a time I loved, What's happened to my beloved? There's nothing left but answerless questions, What's happening, do you have any suggestions? I'm losing myself, You're losing yourself... Don't make me lose what I've only just gained, Can't you see the expressions, all so pained? Once I drew away from all, At least I returned at your call. Why can't you hear me when I cry, Why can't you hear my heart's sigh? Don't leave again, Must I remain? Alone in the darkness I walk once more, I'm searching for a way to open the door... The Light is calling... Again I'm falling... Even the darkest shadow can be reborn, But now I'm stuck between the two-- torn. Is this then the end? Don't leave me, my... friend. Tianas poem written from her characters point of view Tiana explained that the poem was about her character struggling again with her dark side, and calling out to both her (Shadow) and her Master, Jandalf. What is quite remarkable is the range of interpersonal linguistic resources that Tiana has used to convey this depth of angst to the reader. Using what Martin terms the appraisal system (a way of understanding how words are used to convey affective meanings to the reader), I will provide a brief summary of the resources used by Tiana in her poem. First, the range of material processes (and circumstantial qualifiers) she uses include: stuck here, standing here, losing myself, drew away, searching, and falling. The repetition of the process, stuck is a further means of highlighting this fearful state. These processes work together in the poem to emphasise the nightmare-ish quality of experience that her character is having the sense of being frozen, unable to move and of falling into nowhere all reminiscent of a horrible dream. She also uses the verbal process of cry, and hearts sigh, and these are made particularly poignant because nobody hears or recognizes these pained expressions. The detailed nominal group, a tangled web of mist and betrayal, is a complex combination of the metaphor of the mist and the abstract concept of betrayal. Mist is usually associated with confusion and a lack of clarity, and so the use of this lexical item provides an insight into Tianas inner mind. Furthermore, the use of the word tangled as a classifier of the web has the effect of signifying Tianas insecurity and unhappiness. The constant use of questioning such as: Whats happened?, Must I remain?, and Is this the end?, clearly portrays to the reader Tianas pain, insecurity, fear and anxiety. Although this brief analysis represents only a portion of a full linguistic analysis, it is sufficient to illuminate the complexities of emotion that Tiana has ascribed to her character. That these emotions are also reflective of her own teen angst is revealed in Tianas own admission: I use the live journal as Tiana to get my frustrations out you use those journals to get your inner thoughts out, because you know it won't laugh in your face. I use my characters to get my inner thoughts out. Jandalf also explains how she comes to new understandings about both herself and her character through her diary. In one entry she wrote: The only thing keeping you from sinking into the mires of despondency is that hope you've been clinging to, the one you've always held within your tight grasp. The hope that there is some treasure yet to be found in this perspective of things that they call your life. A fool's hope, perhaps, but it's enough even so. You can only pray it'll be fulfilled soon. In this entry, Jandalf claimed that upon reflection she realized that she was more like her fictional character that shed imagined, since she has often mused why I dont fall into depression myselfand then I recognise that hope that I cling to in my reality. I guess its carried itself across. Tiana also talked about the hybridisation of herself into her character, explaining that she had issues with trusting people and opening up to them. In selecting a piece that she thought exemplified this, she chose the following: How do you betray someone who's been your closest friend for years on end? How do you turn against them-- even if it's to save someone else-- at least, that's what you think. Tiana said, I liked this piece [because] it expressed the struggle that's always there with trust. Ask anyone-- that's my biggest issue. To trust, and let go of feelings that are all too there. This piece was very questioning, as is a lot of the stuff I write. Both girls use their livejournals and blogs to recount early character memories. When I asked Tiana what the source of inspiration for her fictional memories were, she responded that she infused some of her own memories of being teased and picked on by an older boy: I shall admit that of a lot of my part of Lord of the Garlic IS based on reality. Too much of it is. The memories I write in my livejournal are based on what Tiana went through as a crecheling, but a lot of it is based on the [real] distant memories I have. I'm like Tiana, I have holes in my memory, and I can only clearly remember when I was older than 7, really... so... yeah. I admit that I base her memories on my own, at least, what I have clearly... and not so clearly. There was a Kylan, yes-- not by the name of Kylan, I couldn't recall the name if you asked me. There was more than one Kylan. Like LT (little Tiana) I was picked on. I was a little girl, small, and I looked younger than I was. I often ran away and hid, crying in a corner, or whatever. Trying to escape reality, I suppose. I found it fascinating that Tiana had drawn on her own childhood pain to infuse into her character. By doing this, Tiana is doing more than simply creating back story for her fan fiction, she is using the journalling as a means of shaping the identities of their characters. By entering character memories into their journals, they are forming that fictional identity whilst at the same time situating that character into a particular family, time, place and community. Furthermore, through inserting their own real memories into their character's journal entry, they are fusing the two identities, real and fictional, together, creating a hybrid person which is at the same time them and yet not them. The writing of painful memories, which Tiana does so well in her "teasing" entry, that are actual memories of Tiana's from her childhood, into the emotions of the fictional character, allows Tiana to distance herself from that pain and to deal with her pain narratively. One way of thinking about this might be to draw upon Foucaults explanation of how the events and discourses that shape our histories are physically inscribed on the body. Foucault insisted, The body is the inscribed surface of events (traced by language and dissolved by ideas), the locus of a dissociated self (adopting the illusion of a substantial unity), and a volume in perpetual disintegration. Genealogy, as an analysis of descent, is thus situated within the articulation of the body and history. Its task is to expose a body totally imprinted by history and the process of historys destruction of the body. (Foucault, 148) McNay argued that the body was always already: constructed and regulated by discourses and discursive practices. Malson also believed that Foucault had explained well the way in which discourses and discursive practices can construct the body. Tiana has masterfully recalled those events which left a lasting impression on her, and has used the pain she experienced through her own body to infuse into her characters body, which is then transformed into the livejournal entry which recaptures that pain. Although I have so far discussed the ways in which the girls have both infused aspects of their real selves into their characters, the opposite is also true: the fictional characters are also a means for the girls to fashion new and emerging identities for themselves as they develop into adulthood. The characters allow the girls a freedom and power to author an identity (Bakhtin) which plays out their fantasies and desires: of their physical bodies, their hopes and dreams for the future, and their ideas of romance. Their characters are a rehearsal of who they want to become, and in role-playing that ideal self, they can grow closer to becoming that ideal. Here it is necessary to stress the significant role of the image of their characters in the discursive positioning of self. The duality of their real self as being self, and the self they see reflected in the fictional other of their character, is embedded in the domain of images. We might think of this as both the images constructed through words or the artwork that the girls produce to reflect their characters, but more-so their own imaginations of themselves inside their characters. Grosz, emphasises the imaginary identifications of self through this domain, [r]elations between the self and the other thus govern the imaginary order this is the domain in which the self is dominated by images of the other and seeks its identity in a reflected relation with alterity Imaginary relations are thus two-person relations, where the self sees itself reflected in the other (Grosz, 46). It is the imaginative possibilities of their fictional characters that empower the girls belief to imagine these same possibilities for their real selves. Tiana, reflected on the dialectic nature of her real self and her characters, stating: I model bits of myself into my characters by just letting go, per se. It's really the other way around: I infuse the characters into myself, more. You let the characters become a part of you, let yourself be able to think like they would, and it works the other way around. You can't have a character that doesn't have some of your personality without losing yourself. Tianas statement provides a lucid insight into the blurring of the fictional and real spaces in which she exists, both as herself and as her characters. She talks of always being plugged in to her characters, and as a consequence her real self is blended with the characteristics of the fictional Tiana. Her thoughts are influenced by her role-playing and by the literacy practices she engages in with Jandalf. Her friendship with Jandalf, forged by their joint passion for fantasy, has become one of the most valued friendships in her life, even though they have only met physically on one occasion. Her view of the world is coloured always with the words and worlds of her fan fiction, so much so that as she hears a cool quote, she relates it to her fantasy world. She observes the world through a writers eyes, and her identity as a writer is highly significant to her sense of self. Jandalf, too, talked about the ways in which her character influenced her own sense of self, and impacting her real identity, so much so that she claimed, Ive found that since Ive been using her as one of my main characters, I have beenwellrubbing off on myself, in a way. Im more outgoing than I used to be, and Jandalfs creation and use does figure in that... What both girls have done in fact is to write themselves into a new identity, empowering their realities through their fiction. Jandalf freely wrote about her crush on Obi-Wan Kanobi and revealed that her character was able to explore a romance that she herself had not. Ive never had a boyfriend, as I said, and there's really nothing else to my romantic life. Jandalf is way ahead of me romantically, simply because shes older. I do imagine Ill get married and all that someday and so I paired Jandalf up with my favourite Star Wars male character. Heck, Obi-Wan always was my favourite character period, even before I saw the prequels. I really liked him as an old guy, and when TPM came outwell. Good-looking, too. Thats always a bonus. Heehee. The fictional Jandalf is able to play out the real Jandalfs fantasies of femininity, exploring what it might mean to be romantically involved, to maintain a relationship, to experience a first kiss, and to enjoy the world of love. Her coy giggle (heehee) at describing her romance reflects her youthful naivete and her obvious pleasure in this narrative storyline. The giggle at first glance seems superficial and shallow, and it would be easy to dismiss it. However here I want to draw upon the work of Riviere, who emphasised the notion of masquerade to describe the shallow surface representations of women. She argued that femininity could in fact be constructed as a mask, and performed like a mimic. Riviere stated: Womanliness could therefore be assumed and worn as a mask, both to hide the possession of masculinity and to avert the reprisals expected if she was found to possess it much as a thief will turn out his pockets and ask to be searched to prove that he has not stolen the goods. The reader may now ask how I define womanliness or where I draw the line between genuine womanliness and the masquerade. My suggestion is not, however, that there is any such difference; whether radical or superficial, they are the same thing. (Riviere, 38) Jandalf, through her giggle, is mimicking and performing a mask of femininity, yet from Rivieres perspective, this mask is reflective of the real female inside the mask. Danet makes a similar point but with respect to online spaces, arguing that the internet offers a space for playing and performing gender under the mask of anonymity. The fictional and cyber-mediated Jandalf is engaged in a romance which in fact is a rehearsal of the desires of the real Jandalf as she imagines she can be. Conclusion As I read through the two livejournals of Tiana and Jandalf, several discursively constructed themes of adolescent angst emerge: hiding from the world, inability to open up and trust another, not sharing ones feelings, anxiety about change, relationships with others, peer pressure, idealism, fear of failure. As Gauntlett argues, to interpret the choices we have made, individuals construct a narrative of the self, which gives some order to our complex lives (113). My argument here has been that the livejournals and blogs serve as a strategy for the girls to interpret and make sense of their everyday lives. Tiana, feeling moody and suffering from pre-menstrual pains, quite deliberately chooses to make her character rant and rave, make snippy comments or provocative posts to seek attention. Her outbursts are not designed for inclusion into the fanfiction piece, and are confined to the livejournal. The livejournal provides her with the discursive space in which she can record and examine the effects of her pre-menstrual pain. From a Foucauldian perspective, these entries are in fact an approach to self awareness. Gauntlett said that in forging our identities, we construct a narrative in which we play a heroic role. The fictional characters played by Tiana and Jandalf allow the girls to exaggerate that heroic role and to play with the fantasies of who they want to become. By placing themselves in the God role of narrator, they let us glimpse inside their thoughts and feelings. These thoughts and feelings integrate events from their external worlds, from their past in the instance of Tianas memories of being teased as a child, and from their idealised futures, such as the romantic scenes played out by Tiana and Jether. Giddens states that identity is found in the capacity to keep a narrative going (54) and as Tiana and Jandalf project themselves into their ongoing fanfiction characters, their characters are developing and growing parallel to their real selves. For Giddens, the narrative self of women was traditionally caught up in romantic storylines. Walkerdine states that the images and stories we construct consume and construct our identity. Walkerdine discusses how films of Gidget and xxx provided her with a strongly gendered view of feminine identity linked intimately with love and romance. However Tiana and Jandalf are writing their own science fiction narratives, in which they are Jedi knights, fighting with light sabres, and are active agents of their own futures. Following the current trend of strong female action heroes (such as Buffy) represented in the media, the girls are creating that archetype as their idealised selves. As Gauntlett states, it is common for the narratives of the self to be influenced by the heroic in films (110). In this case, it is common for the narratives of the girls own identities to be both influenced by the fanfiction protagonists that they construct, role-play, and explore through their fictional livejournals and blogs. The process of discovering their character is also a journal of self-discovery, for understanding their pasts and for forging new identities for their futures. Works Cited Bakhtin, Michel. The Dialogic Imagination. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998. Black, Rebecca. Access and affiliation: The New Literacy practices of English language learners in an online anim-based fanfiction community. Paper presented at 2004 National Conference of Teachers of English Assembly for Research, Berkely: CA, 2004. Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge, 1999. Danet, Brenda. Text as Mask: Gender, Play and Performance on the Internet. Cybersociety 2.0: Revisiting Computer-Mediated Communication and Community. Ed. Steve Jones. London: SAGE Publications, 1998. 129-158. Faleiro, Sonia. There is Someone Out There, The Sunday Express, 16 May. 2004. The Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd. 15 Mar. 2005. Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. London: Penguin Books, 1977. Gauntlett, David. Media, Gender and Identity. London: Routledge, 2002. Giddens, Anthony. Modernity and self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age. Cambridge: Polity, 1991. Grosz, Elizabeth. Jacques Lacan: A Feminist Introduction. London: Routledge, 2001 Hall, Stuart. Who Needs "Identity"? Identity: A Reader. Eds. Paul Du Gay, Jessica Evans, and Peter Redman. London: SAGE Publications, 2000. 15-30. Jenkins, Henry. Textual Poachers: Television Fans and Participatory Culture. New York: Routledge, 1992. ---. Why Heather Can Write. MIT Technology Review, Feb. 2004. Lacan, Jacques. Agency of the letter in the unconscious or reason since Freud. Ecrits: a selection (trans. A. Sheridan). London: Routledge, 1977. Lewis, Diane. Understanding the power of Fan Fiction for Young Authors. Kliatt Magazine. Mar. 2004. Malson, Helen. The Thin Woman: Feminism, Post-Structuralism and the Social Psychology of Anorexia Nervosa. London: Routledge, 1998. Martin, Jim. Beyond Exchange: APPRAISAL Systems in English. Evaluation in Text: Authorial Stance and the Construction of Discourse. Ed. Susan Hunston and Geoffrey Thompson. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. McClellan, Jim. How to Create a Blog-buster, Guardian Unlimited, 10 Apr. 2004: McNay, Lois. Foucault: Critical Introduction. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994. Mulvey, Laura. Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. Visual and Other Pleasures. Indiana Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989. Riviere, Joan. Womanliness as Masquerade. Formations of Fantasy. Ed. Victor Burgin. Methuen: London, 1929/1986. Shaw, David. Gay Men and Computer Communication: A Discourse of Sex and Identity in Cyberspace. Virtual Culture: Identity & Communication In Cybersociety. Ed. Steve Jones. London: SAGE Publications, 1998. 133-145. Silvester, Niko. Fictional Blogging, About, 10 Mar. 2004. About Inc. 17 Mar. 2005. http://teenwriting.about.com/b/a/071172.htm Stone, Allucquere Rosanne. Sex and Death among the Disembodied. VR, Cyberspace, and the Nature of Academic Discourse. The Cultures of Computing. Ed. Susan L. Star. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers, 1995. Thomas, Angela. Digital Literacies of the Cybergirl. E-Learning. 1.3 (2004): 358- 382. Turkle, Sherry. Life on the Screen. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995. Wakeford, Nina. Networking Women and Grrrls with Information/ Communication Technology: Surfing Tales of the World Wide Web. The Cybercultures Reader. Ed. David Bell, and Barbara M. Kennedy. London: Routledge, 2000. 350-359. Walkerine, Valerie. Wolff, Janet. Reinstating Corporeality: Feminism and Body Politics. The Feminism and Visual Culture Reader. Ed. Amelia Jones. London: Routledge, 2003. 414-425. Wood, Aylish. Fresh Kill: Information Technologies as Sites of Resistance. Technospaces Inside the New Media. Ed. Sally Munt. London: Continuum, 2001. 161-174. Wright, Tim. Blog Fiction, trAce, 16 Jan. 2004. trace Online Writing Centre. 17 Mar. 2005. 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