Hello everyone and welcome! My name is Bruna, and I am currently a senior studying Entertainment Management at the University of Central Florida. I decided to transfer my degree to this major from previously studying Communications as I realized every time I learned more and more about the entertainment industry specifically, it made me want to dig deeper into the ins and outs of that world and be a part of it, maybe even one day make a difference in it. So here I am today, writing this post for a senior class project hoping to soon graduate and officially start my career in entertainment. I have some previous experiences from working as a performer, internships in the area, organizing events on campus, and volunteering, but love every opportunity I can to keep learning and hope to soon grow my professional portfolio even more.
My first memory ever of the entertainment industry was attending a concert at the age of 5, or maybe I was 6. My mom took me to a show of artists she was a big fan of, and I don’t remember a lot about them specifically besides singing their songs in the car with her, but I do remember the feeling of being in that room. I remember being surrounded by people singing the same lyrics, screaming them with passion, some even crying, and immediately I was completely amazed. From that point on, I started to notice more and more how music can have such a huge impact on us and going to concerts kind of became my thing.
One thing I think I also noticed early on was how fangirls, specifically for musical artists, had a very negative stigma about them. I remember being young and ashamed sometimes to say I was a fan of certain artists because I didn’t want to be made fun of, or because I didn’t want to be seen as obsessive or crazy. If I ever recommended to play songs in the car of an artist I was a fan of it was always a no because that’s just girly music and not real music. Why is it that girls being fans of a popular artist is a bad thing? Is that not the point of artists putting out music and going on tours? Isn’t that dedicated consumer on the other side what keeps the industry alive? Surely, I’m not saying girls are the only base of the music industry, but this unfavorable image of these fans has always bothered me. For this reason, I decided to dedicate this project to studying fangirls. In the next couple of weeks, I will be researching and telling you, my readers, what I have found out about fangirls and fan culture. I want to know more about the history of this term, how they affect the industry and the financial aspects, how they have made a difference and how social issues impact this group, the rise of fandoms alongside social media, and hopefully this will help me prove that fangirls can be the future of the music industry and should be appreciated instead of ridiculed.
To start off, like any good story, I went and researched where the term “fangirl” began. What led to this idea of a fandom being made up of screaming passionate girls? Some researchers have said that the idea of a fandom, in general, first became known in the 1960s following Star Trek (Hellekson). This was the first time there was a group of fans that became very involved in the art they were following, going beyond just being a supporter or someone that enjoys a form of entertainment. They were very dedicated, becoming creators on top of being just followers, starting their own sort of community with the one similarity being they were fans of Star Trek. Before that, the Oxford Dictionary used the term fan to refer to followers of sports, and only then later, theatre. Isn’t that ironic? The first idea of a fan was used to describe mainly men that were devoted to watching teams play sports.
The first evidence of a fandom related to music, and where we see it merge more towards being a passionate female-based group of fans, is from the time of Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra. The recent movie starring Austin Butler as Presley really showed how strongly the girls felt about supporting the singer and how adoring of the star the fans were. It also showed how big of a part they were in him reaching his success, and still followed the stigma of crazy screaming fans. This later paved the way to what we now know as probably the biggest fandom movement in history, Beatlemania.
While researching fangirls, fandoms, history of fans, or anything related, the results all somehow led to Beatlemania. That is where it all really started. In case you don’t know, Beatlemania was the enthusiastic movement that followed the band The Beatles and their success when first starting out. Researchers point out that in the 60s, at a time of great revolutions and change, this was the first widespread outburst that actually featured women in a radical context. Before The Beatles, women were more quiet followers of music, strictly following their routines in housework under parental control (Cura). However, studies have actually shown that the reason so many girls idolized the band is because they saw a little bit of themselves in the singers. It wasn’t just sexually charged, as the media likes to define it, but The Beatles helped many female fans feel empowered, assertive, and created a secure environment for girls to express themselves in. The girls that were now labeled as obsessive and hysterical have said they really just identified with the singers and wanted to have for themselves the independence in life choices the band represented (Lewis). They made such an impact that The Beatles are still one of the greatest names in music, and their records still play in households to this day.
From that point on, a lot of big names in music have been shown to also have behind them a big female led following group. Still, these girls aren’t always taken seriously, as well as some of the artists they support. Beatlemania is just one example of how much power fandoms can have on the industry and artists’ success, but also show how a lot of the deeply rooted meanings behind their devotion is social issues and causes in their lives they want to change. In the next couple of weeks, I hope to dive deeper into these issues as well as this impact fans can have in the industry. Thanks for reading, and I hope to see you next time. Until then, remember to treat people with kindness :)
Cura, Kimberly (2009) “She Loves You: The Beatles and Female Fanaticism,” Nota Bene: Canadian Undergraduate Journal of Musicology: Vol. 2: Iss. 1, Article 8.
Hellekson, K., Busse, K., & Coppa, F. (2006). A Brief History of Media Fandom. In Fan fiction and fan communities in the age of the internet: New essays. essay, McFarland & Co.
Lewis, L. A., Waldron, D., & Fiske, J. (1992). Beatlemania: Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. In The adoring audience. essay, Routledge.
