Slash Fiction

Slash fiction is a form of fanfic featuring a same-sex pair of fictional characters, typically from commercial media, in a romantic or sexual relationship not in the original. Slash, in this context, refers to a virgule sign.

It started with Star Trek “Kirk/Spock” and other media-related stories at a time when such relationships were very much closeted, and may have been meant to be derogatory toward gays.

The beginnings were in privately circulated stories in the late 1960s, with the first K/S stories in fanzines appearing in the early to mid-’70s. Use of the virgule showed up later in the 1970s, apparently first in Starsky & Hutch zines; the term slash dates to about 1981 in the same milieu.

• Entry at Wikipedia.
• Article at Fanlore, with detailed history and many sub-articles.
• “Usage of the word ‘slash’ and the virgule ‘/’ alone” by Mary Ellen, Alternate Universes, December 16, 2002 (archived).

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Fanspeak

1980s—

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