Fanzines, where do they come from?

Fanzines

“Zines or fanzines are magazines written by enthusiasts, “fans”. They have various forms but are typically self-published, designed, written or edited by a single person” (British library)

Fanzines originated from the Science Fiction and Superhero fan community. It became an official term when it was added in the oxford dictionary. In 1970 punk zines were often associated with fanzines, since their were very popular in the punk community at the time. They slowly started to become more and more popular, people begun to distribute them in pubs, bookshops, and gigs. People started to publish football related fanzines it was a major success and became mainstream. But why were people so attracted to fanzines? It allowed t0 discuss issues within their community and to express certain kinds of viewpoints. It created a nice alternative to the highly edited fashion magazines that only focused on looks and presented highly edited content. In the 1990 they reached their peak of popularity. Fanzine writers even became a proper job. When the digital age approached the culture of fanzines changed. Since Fanzines nowadays are not about the fan community at all anymore, the term was changed to just Zines. With the digital age not only the medium used to produce zines changed but also the content. Now the authors want to express themselves, show their individuality and speak out about important issues that aren’t being addressed in the mainstream media. In comparison to when fanzines first caught the eye of the public, they focussed on community much more. This might be connected to the communal feeling the internet creates, we are not anymore disconnected because of distance or class, the internet helped with accepting individuality.

Nowadays we want to show our individuality as much as possible. One could argue that the need to belong is stronger than ever since we live in a world where the internet has replaced community. On the other hand the internet creates community as well but in a very different way than what people are used to. It gives us the perfect platform to speak out against problems as individuals and makes the process of standing up for yourself easier because we don’t have to look the people in the eye that we are communicating to online. We are becoming confident internet users but that could affect our confidence in reality. We don’t come together as big communities anymore instead we unite online but that could take away from the power we once had. Instead of fighting together we find our own battles which could lead to us not having a strong voice at all.

But what is better? Having a real live object in your hands to gain information or having everything available to us by the click of a button. The idea of holding a physical copy of a magazine in your hands is much more attractive than just starring into a cold, maybe dirty screen. I have often heard that digital is going to completely replace the physical but I have a hard time believing that. Don’t we need feel the page under our fingers, to experience the object we are holding, not everything can be replaced by the digital. For example watching a movie from a foreign and beautiful place could never replace the feeling of actually hopping on a plane and visiting that place… at least I hope it will never come to that. It’s the same with computer games, they can be exciting and giving the opportunity to do things that would the gamer never do in real life but it cannot replace reality. We need to talk to other people face to face instead of chatting to them online. that is the same concept with zines, once in a while we need to hold a physical copy in our hands because it might bring across a different message than reading something online or can be more engaging.

_45510940_0409006-l — Man loving fanzines.

What is a special collection?

According to the dictionary a special collection is: “a collection of materials segregated from general library collection according to form,subject, age, condition, rarity, source, or value.” (dictionary.com)

Special collections are treated differently, they are usually more valuable than normal collections and presented separately. Items from special collections are available by request and can only be borrowed for a limited amount of time.

source: amazon (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sniffin-Other-Habits-Anything-Uproar/dp/B0088C3EM8/?qid=1386293070&s=books&sr=1-10&keywords=Sniffin+Glue&ie=UTF8&ref=sr_1_10)

Checkout this awesome fanzine tumblr: http://fanzines.tumblr.com

Bibliography