K / S

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K / S is a topic of slash fiction . It covers the relationship between Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock from the television series Starship Enterprise . K / S is usually described in the form of stories, but it can also be the subject of images and, for some years now, videos too. Most of the fan fiction stories are homoerotically charged and often contain detailed sexual descriptions. Less common names are Kirk / Spock or Spirk . Like all slash fiction, it is mostly written by straight women.

Surname

K / S was the first widespread fanfiction adaptation of the homoerotic theme. This was later included in numerous other pairings and gave the topos its name through the slash . Later scenes used the nomenclature to name their own subjects, such as H / W for Holmes / Watson stories. In times when fan fiction was still primarily distributed through fanzines , these were often identified in fanzine lists with one or more letters. For example ST for conventional Star Trek fanzines, BG for Battlestar Galactica or later K / S for fanzines that specialized in Kirk / Spock stories.

K / S was the first described relationship, is the most widespread and has lasted for 30 years without interruption. Research in particular has taken up K / S to look at slash fiction in general. The Oxford Dictionary of Science Fiction lists the first mention of Kirk / Spock in 1977, the first mention of K / S in 1978, but lists the term under K / S.

history

The first K / S stories were written in the 1970s. The first ever recorded slash fiction story was "A Fragment of Time" by Diane Marchant, which appeared in Grup III -Fanzine in 1974 , while other authors put the scene in 1968, the year of the first Star Trek broadcast United Kingdom. At that time, the stories were still passed on clandestinely. Even within the Trekdom , the writers and readers of K / S stories were outsiders who were often ridiculed or insulted. They mostly contacted each other by post, through fanzines or met on the fringes of Star Trek conventions. They feared being ridiculed or even sued. At least in the UK, where a scene has been going on since the 1970s, the stories violated laws protecting morality. If you wanted to order one of the fanzines at this time, you usually had to enclose a written declaration that you are older than 18.

The advent of the internet changed the scene significantly. It was now possible for them to network across other areas and to leave the close ties of the Star Trek conventions and fanzine scene. It is now a lively scene that is open and networked around the world. The genre also survived the 1994 screen death of James Kirk unscathed. Since the turn of the millennium, K / S has begun to dominate all fan fiction in the Star Trek universe, a development that sometimes provokes violent backlash from the authors of other stories.

Researcher Constance Penley described the scene at the time as a purely amateur scene, producing hundreds of stories that were produced in professional-looking fanzines. K / S pictures could trade for hundreds of dollars at conventions. In the mid-1980s there were around 500 very active fans who wrote and produced and reached a significantly larger number of readers and buyers.

In the meantime, for example, there are also K / S music videos in which enterprise scenes with music have been re-edited to emphasize the relationship between Kirk and Spock, or separate prizes for the best stories like the K / Stars .

content

K / S differs from other Star Trek fan fiction in that it is only slightly plot-driven and directs all attention to the relationship between the two protagonists. Sex or detailed descriptions appear in many, but by no means in all stories. To Pornography in the narrower sense it is not because the sexual acts are always part of a larger narrative.

The K / S stories have an ambivalent relationship to the established and official Star Trek canon. On the one hand, the fictional world of the series serves to have introduced characters and an established background that a KS story no longer needs to explain. On the other hand, the background situates the people in certain situations that either restrict the authors' freedom or have to be circumvented first.

A popular technique to free Kirk and Spock from the narrow framework of the series is the "vacation topos", in which both are portrayed on vacation far from the spaceship Enterprise. Injury stories are common, especially among newbies, in which one of the two characters is injured and is cared for by the other. While this type of story is common throughout slash fiction, Ponn Farr stories are a K / S specialty. Ponn Farr is a periodically occurring sexual arousal in Vulcans in the Star Trek universe. Mind meld is also K / S-specific , a technique in the Star Trek universe that enables two characters to merge their consciousness.

K / S is also unusual in that it explicitly introduces homosexual elements into Star Trek. Although the series is set in a utopian future in which all people on earth are reconciled and people of all skin colors and origins treat each other peacefully, there was no homosexual character in the series until Star Trek: Deep Space Nine . Falzone interprets K / S in such a way that the fans partly live out their need for a homosexual component in Star Trek, or on the other hand they look for an area of ​​relative freedom that has not yet been colonized by the official canon and its spin-offs. K / S is so far removed from what is officially and commercially possible that there is no danger of being threatened by official spin-off series, merchandise, by-products.

Authors

As in general in slash fiction, the majority of authors are straight women, cases in which men write slash fiction are extremely rare, in most fanzines or forums a man appears only once every few years and is accordingly detailed welcomed.

Explanations as to why straight women of all people write homosexual stories range from the double attractiveness that two men exert, the importance of the relationship and the unimportance of sexuality, to the limited repertoire of characters in Star Trek that makes a homosexual relationship inevitable. The last explanation, however, has fallen out of fashion, since there were also female lead roles in later Star Trek incarnations, but K / S remains by far the most popular fan fiction pairing. More complex psychoanalytic explanations are also available, but mostly limited to a single researcher.

Reactions

Kirk and Spock already have a close relationship in the television series. Series creator Gene Roddenberry described them as my two halves that complement each other.

The relationship between the Star Trek rights holders and the K / S scene has changed over the years. Gene Roddenberry wrote in 1979 a clarification from Kirk insisting on his sole attraction to women. In 1984 the Star Trek screenwriter and author of a book on Star Trek described it as a nuisance to be endured . He can not ignore the K / S ladies and is annoyed that even a clear Roddenberry statement about friendship does not prevent them from doing what they do, and that they have already prevented numerous young people from attending Star Trek conventions or official Star Trek Buy Trek material. Later, Roddenberry was much more conciliatory and attested the Kirk / Spock relationship in the series Overtones of Love. Deep love. But they never indicated physical actions, but all had the impression that the feeling for it was sufficient. The Star Trek rights holders Paramount accept the existence of the scene but do not support it.

Even with other fans of the series, K / S encountered and continues to encounter a lot of resistance. In the 1980s the authors were often referred to as FUBS (Fat, Ugly Bitches). Many fans accuse the K / S authors of taking too much liberties with the characters and revealing the "true content" of Star Trek.

Remarks

  1. ↑ Falzone p. 243
  2. ↑ a b c d Constance Penley: Feminism, Psychoanalysis, and the Study of Popular Culture in: Lawrence Grossberg, Cary Nelson, Paula A. Treichler (eds.): Cultural studies Psychology Press, 1992 ISBN 0415903459 p. 480
  3. ↑ a b c Falzone p. 244
  4. ↑ K / S in: Jeff Prucher (ed.) Brave new words: the Oxford dictionary of science fiction Oxford University Press US, 2007 ISBN 0195305671 p. 107
  5. ↑ Falzone p. 257
  6. ↑ Falzone p. 245
  7. ^ A b Gail Dines, Jean McMahon Humez: Gender, Race, and Class in Media: A Critical Reader SAGE, 2010 ISBN 1412974410 p. 63
  8. ↑ Constance Penley: NASA / Trek: popular science and sex in America Verso, 1997 ISBN 0860916170 p. 105
  9. ↑ a b c d Falzone p. 246
  10. ↑ a b Falzone p. 248
  11. ↑ a b Falzone p. 247
  12. ↑ Falzone p. 249
  13. ↑ Catherine Salmon and Don Symons: Slash Fiction and Human Mating Psychology P. 94 Vol. 41, No. 1, Evolutionary and Neurohormonal Perspectives on Human Sexuality (Feb., 2004), p. 94
  14. ↑ a b Falzone p. 252
  15. ^ Constance Penley, Andrew Ross: Technoculture U of Minnesota Press, 1991 ISBN 0816619301 p. 159
  16. ↑ Constance Penley: NASA / Trek: popular science and sex in America Verso, 1997 ISBN 0860916170 p. 159
  17. ↑ Falzone p. 251

literature

  • PJ Falzone: The Final Frontier Is Queer: Aberrancy, Archetype and Audience Generated Folklore in K / S Slashfiction Western Folklore Vol. 64, No. 3/4, Film and Folklore (Summer - Fall, 2005), pp. 243-261
  • Patricia Frazer Lamb and Diana Veith: Romantic Myth, Transcendence, and Star Trek Zines in: Erotic Universe 1986