Mick Winter Teaching, Writing and Learning through Popular Culture Fall 2010 MACM Professor Tara Brabazon I am not a Vampire Slayer – Reflections on the Academic/Fan Relationship I am not now, nor have I ever been, a slayer of vampires. I have never imagined that I was, nor wished that I were, a vampire slayer. I have no direct, nor to my knowledge indirect, vested interest in the slaying of vampires, and I have never physically assisted in the slaying of vampires—that is to say, I am not a stakeholder . 1 I have never believed that I was part of a special world, a world in which some of us know The Truth about reality and the existence of evil forces out to destroy our world, and that Buffy the Vampire Slayer was a key to that truth. I do not possess secret information known only to the true followers of Buffy . I also wish to state that I have never had a direct personal relationship with a vampire, a vampire slayer, nor any of the denizens of the world of vampires and vampire slayers. Yes, I did have a certain attraction to a vengeance demon 2 , but my ardor quickly cooled when I discovered that the actress portraying said demon was an active member of a political party diametrically opposed to my own political and social beliefs. And, yes, there was a certain god 3 that I considered quite diabolically appealing. However, she was killed before returning to her own hell dimension and my attraction correspondingly diminished. I have never dressed up as a vampire slayer nor have I ever purchased vampire slayer paraphernalia, mementos, or any other artifacts connected with the One True Slayer. 4 I have never attended Buffy Cons. I have never posted to an online Buffy group nor have I written or read a single word of Buffy fan fiction. I have not read Buffy comic books. 5 I have not played Buffy video games, role-playing games or multiplayer games. I have (had actually 6 ) never visited the website of Slayage—The Journal of the Whedon Studies Association. I have never purchased books by academics and others on the subject of Buffy, her friends, their nocturnal activities, and the deeper meaning of it all. 7 1 I thought “stakeholder” was pretty clever until I discovered that every possible Buffy pun has already been used a number of times, a fact confirmed not only by Google but even by Google Scholar. 2 See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anya_Jenkins, accessed on 26 October 2010. There is no apparent proof that the fictional Anya Jenkins is related to Henry Jenkins. 3 Oddly not referred to as a goddess, although she was female. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glory_(Buffy_the_Vampire_Slayer), accessed on 26 October 2010. 4 The report that I had a Close Encounter with fandom and purchased a lifesize 5' 10” cardboard standup of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is inaccurate. My daughter intervened, and the purchase was never consummated. 5 Although now that my research for this paper has shown they exist, I may take a look at “Season Eight.” 6 In the course of this research I did visit the website a number of times. See www.slayageonline.com, accessed on 24 November 2010. 7 They were gifts. 1