Language, Culture, and Identity in Online Fanfiction

Abstract

This article draws on constructs in second-language acquisition, literacy, cultural, and media studies as theoretical bases for examining how networked technologies and fan culture provide a young English language learner (ELL) with a site for developing her English language and writing skills. During this process, she also develops an online identity as a popular, multiliterate writer. To understand how this happens, the notion of identity is explored as a fluid construct that shifts over time with this ELL's long-term participation in a fan community. Popular and fan culture are also examined as points of affiliation and as dialogic resources that she appropriates, both in her writing and in her interactions with other fans. In so doing, the article demonstrates how popular culture and technology converge to provide a context in which this adolescent ELL is able to develop a powerful, transcultural identity, discursively constructed through the different cultural perspectives and literacies that she and other fans from across the globe bring to this space.