In my anthropology class we have been discussing subcultures in today's american society. Each student in my class had to give a small presentation on which subculture they thought they belonged to. Well, naturally I picked fandom- more specifically dokuga fandom.

While presenting I found my self at a loss trying to explain why I felt I belonged to this community.

So my challenge is this: Tell me what you think it means to be a dokugan and what this community means to you.

I look forward to your replies!

The reason I chose to be a dokugan is because I have fell in love with the character Sesshoumaru when I first started watching the Inuyasha series. Then as I watched I started this ...'hm instead of Kagome fawning over that idiot Inuyasha why not give his brother a go?' line of thinking. Then as the series came to a ending and while it was awesome the way it was, I wanted it to go another direction and tweak the personalities of some of the characters a tad little bit to my liking.

When I accidently discovered there was a community of 'I wish it went this way between Sesshoumaru and Kagome' fans online, Im like, this is me!!! This is where I can share what I wanted to happen while entertaining others with my ideas. I noticed a lot of other people join because they wanted to try their hand at writing and see if they want to make a career out of it. -nods- and there are a lot of people here who are novel worthy.

Basically, in my opinion I think Dokuga, or any fandom site like this, is a community of people who have that "This is what I want to happen in the Inuyasha Series." or "I wish this character acted like this" or my favorite syndrome..."Someone please fill that god awful angsty gap in my head concerning those two possilbe love birds!!!"

Not sure if that made any since what so ever...but I thought Id give it a go and share something if anyhting ^_^

D.O.D

To tell the truth it all started with looking for a music video called angel by amanda perez and I first found a kagome-sesshomaru one and I was like their are people that like this pairing. I must admit to being a Sesshomaru fan myself though I can't really put it into words, my freinds also thought yeah a was more of a Sesshy fangirl. and long story short I looking of pairings online and found fanfiction and then this site and fell in love with the site for freedom of writing which I enjoy. I am conflicted because I considered myself a goth more but I like this too.

I think DoD captured my feeling quite well... I got into fanfiction after having been roped into watching both Witch Hunter Robin and InuYasha by my daughter. I first joined a Witch Hunter Robin fan site then, when that dwindled, found myself hanging out on A Single Spark a lot. Through that site, I met some absolutely incredible people... and the rest is history.

I'm involved here as part of a promise to Miss Kagura, the person who started Dokuga. I promised her, when she got the idea for creating the site, that I would do whatever was needed to support her vision. I managed to stay relatively uninvolved in the day-to-day running of the site until she flat-out asked me for my help. After that, I became part of the Admin team on a daily basis. When Miss K went walkabout, I found myself in the position of being the only person who could serve as a clearinghouse for the donations we received to keep Dokuga alive.

As a result of the emergency we faced last year, and the donation drives we've had over the past year, I've had the opportunity to talk to many people from around the WORLD. I've heard so many stories of how the site had helped people through difficult times in their lives... how the people on the site have been supportive, loving and helpful through crises... how some people felt they had nowhere else to turn, but stumbled here and found a home.

It has been both humbling and amazing to hear these stories from so many people, and to realize the reach this site has worldwide. I find myself grateful for the opportunity to help keep this site running when it provides such a worthwhile service to so many. I feel awed by the generosity of our members when it comes time to ask for funds to keep the site open. Basically, Dokuga functions as a microcosm of society as a whole, but without all the other dividing factors.

We come together because of our desire to explore where this pairing might have gone in this fictional world, but we reach across so many other lines... national, societal, religious, racial... all of them are blurred and forgotten here. We are as anonymous as we wish to be, or as public as we wish. We find kindred souls with whom to communicate, fellow humans to share our views, and this helps us feel less isolated in our own skins.

Sooo... sorry it's so long, but I've been wanting to share these thoughts with someone for a while now. I hope you find it helpful in analyzing the community... for we really ARE a community. We have a framework within which we work, rules that we all must follow, and we all contribute to the community's upkeep via donations (kinda like taxes?), much like the spoken and unspoken rules of societies everywhere.

Thanks so much for asking this question. I hope you get the information you need for your quest!

~~Wiccan~~

I think most people would agree that this website if for their love for the Kagome/Sesshou pairing I first fell in love with this pairing with Tales From the House of the Moon, by thinking it was an Inu/Kag.

But, to address you question: honestly, Dokuga is my escape from reality when it gets a little too hectic. Here, we can all escape for a little while, whether by chat, writing, or drawing. We can be us and know that we are not judged by our fellow Dokugans.

-MissKatt

I feel sort of odd here.

I'm not a huge Sesshomaru fan... or even a Kagome fan. I had never even considered such a pairing on my own. I was introduced to A Single Spark and the Sesshomaru/Kagome pairing by way of someone on livejournal. They challenged me to write this pairing and I found the complexity of the relationship dynamic unique and interesting, and fell in love with that.

After I joined A Single Spark, I was somewhat of a loner and tried to keep to myself for some time, but I met some people on the forums there and had interesting discussions with them. There was a sense of camaraderie during those days, a feeling of being supported in writing things (the pairing) that others viewed as strange. Many of us were young and still growing into our lives, into who we would be not only as writers and artists but as people. We didn't always get along or agree. Heck, I remember when the concept of Dokuga began floating around and people were divided. (I was on the side that was actually against Dokuga until Spark closed for good. It seemed redundant at the time.)
When I started suffering from my first real writer's block I decided to leave the group, despite having been around for some time and having made a few friendships. However, when I first came back I remember a odd sensation of belonging. That only strengthened by my newer friendships with members such as smo, naq, and hat - and having many wonderful conversations with Wiccan. Being here has bolstered not only my confidence in my writing abilities but also taught me things about myself that I didn't know before. I'm able to explore who I am as a writer and a person, freely and without many restraints.

That is what good online communities do, they support you in ways similar to offline communities. You're able to learn things and discover more of the world that we all live in. Even now, we support one another where instead of just writing for an unusual pairing, we're now also writing for a dying fandom.

Nothing is perfect, even Dokuga, but if we can get around our differences and work together this community can last for many more years to come. I only hope to see that happen.

oooh! This is right up my ally! I'm a sociology major!

I think whats great about "subcultures" is that they are in themselves a paradigm of opposites. For example, you associate yourself with a subculture because you feel like you belong there. You're with like minded folks that make you feel safe and accepted. in this regard you are a part of the mass. However, the subculture also gives you identity and individuality, that seperates you from the whole of society. Where you associate yourself with a taboo culture like the "gothic" crowd or a vanilla group like bike "riders."

The specifics of why we feel like we belong to DOkuga is of course individual, but i think everyone can agree that when people NOT in the subculture of fandom (and no Dokuga specific, but ANY fandom) know that you write or read fanfiction they make jokes or have unkind assumptions about what that means about YOU. You don't have to face those judgements within your own subculture.

MoxyMikki wrote:

The specifics of why we feel like we belong to DOkuga is of course individual, but i think everyone can agree that when people NOT in the subculture of fandom (and no Dokuga specific, but ANY fandom) know that you write or read fanfiction they make jokes or have unkind assumptions about what that means about YOU. You don't have to face those judgements within your own subculture.

Indeed. Like the ever famous:

"Oh, so you're not a real writer."

The other day my doctor asked me what I do for hobbies and interest and I said I am a writer and the question that always follows seems to be: "So what do you write?"

I used to explain in great detail about how I write fanfiction as a means to stretch my writing legs and learn more while improving my skills. Now?

"I write horror."

That pretty much ends the conversation without getting extremely weird looks.

YESH!!!!

And the joke is that - IMO - fanfiction writing takes more skill than your run of the mill paperback that you find in major book stores. Anyone can invision and create characters, but trying to use exhisting characters and writing them to keep in character and to other readers concept of those characters, is NOT for the faint of heart, is it?! Not to mention enduring flames and rants that come to even the BEST of FF writers. When you are a "real" (*scoff*) writer, you have editors and an entire team of people to not only help you with your story, but to block any responce which might hurt and discourage, and send those muses hiding!

And quite frnakly, I've read FF writers that are far more elloquent and deep in their writing than published writers. So the idea of a "real" writer is a total joke.

And I tell people a write fiction. I go no further because I don't want to endure the "oh, so you're one of THOSE people" looks.

zandrellia wrote:
Indeed. Like the ever famous:

"Oh, so you're not a real writer."

I don't tell people unless we're super close what I write. It's just not accepted in my social circle. I have no clue why but with my stereotype in society it just doesn't work that way. Telling people what I write would go like this:

"I write fanfiction."
"What?"
"You know - take characters from popular shows, books, etc. and make your own story."
"What do you use?"
"Anime."
"Huh?"

Not okay.

To the topic at hand. I was pulled into Sesshoumaru x Kagome by Enchanted Orbs [Rated T] or by The Red Hunger [Rated M] I don't remember which started the obsession. Umm - I actually read and wrote Inuyasha Crossovers so the idea of Kagome and Sesshoumaru wasn't weird for me.

As for fandoms - I don't really say I belong to fandoms. I like to be apart of them but myself as person, as a whole, my community is not fandoms. My community is writers and I belong with writers because writers have the ability to create that which doesn't exist - fantasy writers in particular. I like that - I enjoy creating characters and making them my own. I enjoy putting something out there that makes my people, laugh, cry, be angry, be excited. Anyone can write a story but to write and be successful and known it takes something else.

I like creating an emotional response. I write fanfiction because it paves the way in writing to doing it professionally. In fanfiction - you can use a character made by another until you're confidant in making your own. And once you make your own you can add them in and see how people respond. This then opens the door to A/U and if that can be done then your own story can be done.

I belong to a writers because they have the ability to see from other perspectives. If they didn't they wouldn't be able to write for multiple characters. I wouldn't say I belong to fandoms - I belong where there are other writers.

At first it was a fascination with the characters, particular Kagome, but after a while I came to the realization that I was interacting with a rather large group of females without scaring them away from me in the process, so I think Dokuga really helped to save my sanity as far as being social goes, so I'll probably always have a huge attachment to Dokuga, even if I'm not always on all the time.

I don't even remember how I got started on Fanfiction. What I do know is that once I got started, there was no stopping. Finding a place where others had a similar fascination was just a bonus. I feel like I am part of an international family that, for the most part, encourages and supports our common love of the pairing.

From a writer's standpoint (I speak only for myself) it's a place to learn to write, to be encouraged to write better and a place to belong. From a reader's standpoint it's a place to find really incredible stories from all walks of life and all different cultures. It's a common ground, I guess. Nobody is better than anyone else.

Thanks so much to each of you who replied! <3
It was heart-warming to see so many people with feelings similar to my own and very interesting to see the other reasons.
I hope that people continue finding what it is they come here for; whether its for friends, the stories, or an escape.

I started like many other people in the thread - being a member of A Single Spark.

When I first started watching Inuyasha, I was totally in love with his adorable ears. Then I met Sesshoumaru and I knew that I couldn't look at anyone else. No other anime character had ever intrigued me so much. Unfortunately, my best friend "claimed" him and was so obsessive about his relationship with Rin that I never dared to mention that I kind of liked to think of him with Kagome.

That was when I found out that there were other people out there who thought like me. I wrote some short blurbs, then backed off as school got busy. When I entered college, I had some time to really sit down and write. I ended up writing quite a lengthy piece which I had to leave unfinished because of massive writer's block.

When I came back several years later, I found Dokuga!

The people here have always been wonderful and friendly. I had no doubt that I wanted to be a part of such an amazing community.

zandrellia wrote:

After I joined A Single Spark, I was somewhat of a loner and tried to keep to myself for some time, but I met some people on the forums there and had interesting discussions with them. There was a sense of camaraderie during those days, a feeling of being supported in writing things (the pairing) that others viewed as strange. Many of us were young and still growing into our lives, into who we would be not only as writers and artists but as people. We didn't always get along or agree. Heck, I remember when the concept of Dokuga began floating around and people were divided. (I was on the side that was actually against Dokuga until Spark closed for good. It seemed redundant at the time.)

This times one million.

I wish I had something more relevant to add to the conversation, but this pretty much sums it up. I felt a sense of camaraderie that I hadn't felt in any other community. I was really against joining Dokuga at first. It just didn't feel right. I'm glad I did break down and join, though. I have had some amazing times with some great people that I would have never met if it hadn't been for Spark or Dokuga.