ibelieveinthelittletreetopper:
Here’s what’s baffling to me about people who get up in arms about “canon” and use the “it’s not canon” argument to invalidate people’s interpretations of media: canon doesn’t exist.
I mean, in so many words. Mostly, what people mean when they say canon is the notion that there’s ONE be-all-end-all ultimate true platonic-form meaning that usurps all other meanings and they have it because they watched the show harder than anyone, and that’s a fucking farce. Yes, there is a source material, and to an extent, that source material limits personal interpretation because it provides a basic framework for analysis.
But what actually ultimately gives source material value is the way that we as consumers choose to interpret it. And the way we interpret media and take value from it completely depends on our own life experiences, our own circumstances, our own perspectives and personal belief systems. No piece of media will ever be the same to two people. Ever. Ever. Ever. I might disagree with your canon, but I’m never going to invalidate it.
Okay so what I’m trying to say is: if I fucking think Dean is bi and you don’t, who gives a single shit? If we can both argue it, we’re both fucking right. Dean is Schroedinger’s Queer. Deal with it.
Word.
This post also makes me want to bring up something I’ve been wanting to talk about for a while but have been too lazy/ busy to write a post about: as far as media interpretation goes, especially with a TV show that has been on air for eleven years and has gone through several show runners, the so-called creators are no more than fellow consumers, and are therefore included in the Schrödinger’s Paradox of media interpretation.
Think about it for a moment: Jeremy Carver did not think up Dean. Robert Singer did not come up with the character of Sam. Not even Kripke did, not by himself. Dean, Sam and Cas (and everyone else on Supernatural) are characters created in a combined effort of the original show creator, all the writers that have written them over the years, the directors who’ve worked on the episodes, the range of actors that have portrayed them, and a handful of network executives who have recommended or restricted developments in those characters in order to boost ratings.
We all know the author is dead, but when it comes to SPN, the author never existed. Ever since the show aired, there has never been a single one answer to the question “so what’s Dean like”. Which means that a fic that takes the archetype of Dean (the “basic framework” @schmerzerling is talking about) and expresses that character in a way that positively engages the fan audience is just as valid as any episode that airs on the CW. Because seriously, how is Robert Berens joining the writing team in season 9 any different than a fic writer telling their own stories about these characters? They’re both working off the same source material, after all.
Tl;dr canon is a myth, and fandom being transformative is the whole point, so stop looking for “creator” validation and do whatever you want.
Look at these smart people.
Reblogging for “Schrodinger’s queer.”
Also, true, but more importantly, “Schrodinger’s queer.”I don’t watch SPN, but this a) is applicable across fandoms and b) reminds me of a post a friend of mine made a while back about a pedagogy problem she’s been working on: how to distinguish between what she calls “necessary interpretations” and “plausible interpretations.” Here’s the key section (all bolding is mine):
First of all, there is the necessary interpretation – something
that you absolutely need to get in order to make sense of the work at
all, but you still need some level of interpretative sophistication to
get there. For example, in My Last Duchess,
“the speaker is an irrationally jealous control freak who certainly
made his wife’s life miserable, regardless of whether he literally
murdered her or not” is a necessary interpretation; if you don’t get
that out of the text, you aren’t getting the poem. But many students,
particularly in gen ed classes, do not get that out of the text without
prompting, since the Duke isn’t about to TELL you he’s a control freak.
(Some students do not even get “the speaker’s wife is dead and he’s
showing somebody a picture of her” out of the text; I’m never sure what
to do about those.) So most of us, in gen ed classes, spend a fair
amount of time explaining HOW the poem shows that this is the case. In
that sort of situation, you really do need to teach a specific
interpretation, and try to make sure the class is on the same page about
it.But there’s also the plausible interpretation, one that is clearly grounded in the text, but does not absolutely have
to be the case. Mutually-contradictory plausible interpretations can
co-exist. For example, I could argue that the Duke is so convinced of
his own rightness that he has no idea how much he’s just revealed about
his character, and then suddenly at the end of the poem he does realize
it, and his “Nay, we’ll go / Together down, sir” is a desperate attempt
to keep his listener from ducking out and telling the-Count-his-Master
to break off the marriage negotiations right now. You, on the other
hand, could argue that he knows exactly how much he’s revealing,
and wants the man to repeat it all to the Count’s fair daughter so she
will know what sort of behavior he expects of his next wife, and what
will happen to her if she doesn’t obey. We’re both right; or at least
we are if we can find sufficient textual justification for our
respective interpretations.The post as a whole focuses on the difficulties this distinction can pose when you’re trying to teach texts in a way that simultaneously encourages students to debate plausible interpretations without giving the impression to the class that they are necessary interpretations, but the part about plausible interpretations is pretty much what OP describes. Dean being bi, for instance, isn’t a necessary interpretation in the sense that it isn’t what the story is about, so that the show makes sense whether he is or isn’t, but it is a plausible interpretation that can be supported with evidence from the show.