Slash

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Slash is a fan fiction term designating romantic and/or erotic (and/or pornographic) same-sex relationships between fictional characters.

The term comes from the typographical "slash" character: "/", placed between the names or initials of the characters paired in such a relationship, e.g.: "Kirk/Spock" or "K/S", after one of the early popular slash pairings.

Vocabulary

  • Slash fiction is also referred to as slash, in an abbreviated way, or "slash fic".
  • The verb to slash derives from the noun. Fans use it to designate the writing of slash fiction, the practice of reading same-sex relationships in a text, or the making of implications about such relationships (for instance, in fannish conversations about a fandom).
  • Slash fan: someone who writes or enjoys slash. Also, slasher, though this is less common.
  • Slashy, adj., something that has slash-like qualities. Often refers to subtext in the source material, notably in acting performances or in the writing. Also designates fan productions that involve slash, e.g., slashy artwork.
  • Saffic: alternative name for slash fiction concerning female character. (It's a pun on "sapphic".) It is sometimes favoured over the term femslash, because the construction of the word "femslash" carries the implication that slash is only about male same-sex relationships. (Femmeslash is also used, but it carried an implication of emphasized or even excessive femininity, so femslash is preferred by most.)

Translations of the term "slash"

  • In French:
    • Biaiser, verb, meaning "to slash"
  • In Japanese:
    • Yaoi, noun, meaning "male/male stories", an acronym for "no climax, no resolution, no meaning".
    • Yuri, noun, meaning "female/female stories", derived from the term "lily (yuri) tribe" which refered to lesbians.
    • Shounen-ai, noun, meaning "boys love", coined by Western fans of Japanese series to denote romantic male/male stories so that yaoi could be used to denote erotic/pornographic ones.
    • Shoujo-ai, noun, meaning "girls love", coined by Western fans of Japanese series to denote romantic female/female stories so that yuri could be used to denote erotic/pornographic ones.

Practice and Theory of Slash

Practice

The inventors of slash are women.

Women have created, named, and driven the slash phenomenon, and are still the primary producers and consumers of slash.

The position of women as fans in a male-dominated, heterosexist popular culture is intimately linked to the production of slash, and the relations of production of slash.

Theory

There is some controversy over the definition of slash, particularly concerning the requirement of non-canonicity in slash relationships. This is because the term slash emerged in a context where canonical erotic and/or romantic same-sex relationships were rare to non-existent: products of (primarily) North American and British popular culture in the 1970s, especially on television and in the movies. Therefore, in the absence of overt homoerotic material, the distinction between canon and non-canon same-sex relationships became moot.

Since the emergence of canonical same-sex relationships and their increasing overtness in Western popular culture, it has been suggested that the term homoerotic could usefully co-exist with slash to designate, respectively, canonical and non-canonical same-sex relationships. However, this suggestion is not standard usage.

Earlier references to slash also tended to designate only, or primarily, male same-sex relationships. This is due at least in part to the prevalence of male characters over female characters onscreen, and the increased importance accorded to them by the producers of popular culture.

The Four Waves Theory of Slash

This theory was outlined by Lezlie Shell on the Virgule-L mailing list in 1993, and later published in Strange Bedfellows.

Slash fan fiction has four waves. Every wave has quality stories and writers. Every wave has bad stories and poor writers. What you consider good and bad depends on which wave you rode in on.

Lezlie Shell identified herself as a second wave reader and writer, who enjoys some third wave stories and fewer fourth wave stories.

First wave: Character-based stories with slash

A. The relationship between the characters is the point of the story. Slash is a means to intensify that relationship.

B. These stories are almost exclusively set in the "real" broadcast universe as the writers' love of the show/characters as presented got them into fandom.

C. The writer invests a great deal of time making characters presented as heterosexual having sex with each other "believeable". In these stories this relationship is not "homosexual" in the political or social sense. The sex acts are between two people of the same sex, but are not "realistic" in relation to the lives of homosexual men.

D. The writers are in fandom (in contact with other fans) and already writing non/slash stories. They view slash as the end of a progression. Would have no trouble classifying a sexless story as slash.

Writers: Sebastian

Second wave: Character-based slash

A. Stories about the characters involved in a slash relationship. The slash characterizations are still tied to the aired ones, but the writers do more extrapolation without looking for "proof" in the aired episodes. Certain aspects of the first-wave characterizations are accepted on equal footing as aired source material.

B. The majority of the stories are still in the "real" world, but it is a broader world. The few a/u stories are the "real" characters in another time. The reader has no trouble recognizing "aired" characters in these stories.

C. The sex in these stories is more realistic in that the writers have probably read The Joy of Gay Sex, but the sex is still female-oriented.

D. Second wave writers are already a part of fandom and are readers of non/slash fan lit, but there is no doubt that reading slash gave them the impetus to write.

Writers: Pam Rose

Third Wave: Slashing the characters

A. The slash relationship is central to the story. Without it, there would be no story. But there is a story complete with plot.

B. No emphasis on trying to convince the readers that these characters are having sex. The characterizations are based on 1st and 2nd wave stories as much if not more than the episodes.

C. Sex is more realistic in regards to actual homosexual practices. In these stories, one or both of the characters has experience with the same sex (other than the kind of straight-panic male rape experience typical of first wave stories).

D. The writers were drawn into fandom by the slash. To them, there is no such thing as a sexless slash story.

E. Alternate Universe stories come into their own. The A/U is used to remove the characters from the strictures of the "real" world, or to let the characters be out of character.

Writers: Ellis Ward.

Fourth Wave: Multimedia slash

A. Slash goes multi-media. It is commonly accepted that the only admission requirement for a male TV character is a penis. The notion that there was something "special" about K&S or B&D, etc. that made them slashable is viewed with tolerant amusement by the 4th wavers.

B. The characterizations in multimedia are, for the most part, composite slash characterizations built from fan fiction in other fandom. It takes a VERY VERY good writer to do character- based slash for a show that has a limited audience because the readers buy-in is limited.

C. Fourth wave sex, particularly for shows set in present-day America, is more sophisticated. Some stories have one or both characters being bi or homosexual.

D. While the writer will be drawn into fandom by the virtue of writing, the readers may remain fans outside of fandom.

Writers: M. Fae Glasgow and Melody Clark.

Further reading

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