Unconventional Fanworks 2019 Letter

[seinmit]

Hello, lovely creator. I am so excited for this exchange.

One note I want to make at the start is that a lot of this letter is going to be about scholarly sources and ideas. I'm going to, for your reference, link possible citations that might be helpful and real world versions of the types of thing I'm imagining. I want to say up front that I am not, in any way, going to be evaluating whatever gift you give me as Reviewer #2. I'm just so excited about any exploration of these ideas and connections--as much as possible, I urge you not to be intimidated or worry about going out on a limb. The thing that I think is so interesting about philosophy is our ability to manipulate ideas and be playful with them. Explore possibilities! Make connections without perfect textual support! Have fun! Write something you find interesting. I want to see academic texts and philosophical approaches to these things not because I really enjoy grading papers--trust me, I do not. I want to see them because I am a giant fucking nerd.

Request 1: Philosophy RPF
Group: Immanuel Kant/Aliens, Group: Immanuel Kant & Aliens, In-Universe Publication - Alternate Version of Existing Historical Text, In-Universe Publication - Philosophy Paper

OKAY THIS MAY SEEM CRAZy. But Kant had weirdly strong opinions about aliens. And more interestingly, from the perspective of this exchange, aliens being real would have weirdly strong effects on his overall philosophy. The whole point of the Kantian story is that there is something special about humans--their capacity for reason--that allows them to be able to understand the moral law and act freely. Human capacity for reason is identical to their capacity for freedom. There is a strong sense in which this cannot be specific to humans--if we met aliens tomorrow that had the capacity for reason, they would be indistinguishable as moral agents to Kant from humans. Maybe. Or maybe not. Maybe Kant meets aliens and it confirms his understanding of reason as a universal structure of cognition! Or maybe it doesn't? Maybe these aliens are radically different in their reasoning capacity in such a way that challenges the core of his theory. How does he write around it? What does his philosophy look like when it has this totally new input? Him getting fucked by the aliens is optional, but that's always fun.

There actually is a fair amount of scholarly research on Kant & Aliens already out there in the world. Some sources:

Clark, David L. "Kant's Aliens: The Anthropology and Its Others." CR: The New Centennial Review 1, no. 2 (2001): 201-289.

Dick, Steven J. Plurality of Words: The Extraterrestrial Life Debate from Democritus to Kant. CUP Archive, 1984.

Szendy, Peter. Kant in the Land of Extraterrestrials: Cosmopolitical Philosofictions. Oxford University Press, 2013.

Some philosophical work on the implications of extraterrestrials that isn't totally specific to Kant:

Cockell, Charles. "Ethics and extraterrestrial life." In Humans in outer space—Interdisciplinary perspectives, pp. 80-101. Springer, Vienna, 2011.

Dunér, David, Erik Persson, and Gustav Holmberg, eds. The history and philosophy of astrobiology: Perspectives on extraterrestrial life and the human mind. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013.

DNW: Paper written as if from an undergrad/for a seminar.

Request 2: Crossover Fandom
Group: Wakanda & Ta-Nehisi Coates (RPF), Group: Wakanda & James Baldwin (RPF), Group: T'Challa & Ta-Nehisi Coates (RPF), Group: T'Challa (MCU) & Donald Trump (Political RPF), Group: T'Challa (MCU) & Barack Obama (Political RPF), In-Universe Publication - Magazine Article, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Interviews, In-Universe Publication - Alternate Version of Existing Historical Text, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Speech, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Letters

One general note about this: feel free to bring in what Ta-Nehisi Coates has said about Wakanda in regards to his Black Panther Marvel Comics run--but also, this was an MCU request for a reason. If you aren't familiar with that canon, don't worry about it. I'm more interested in TNC the reporter dealing with T'Challa as a historical figure and Wakanda as a historical event.

In-Universe Publication - Magazine Article
For this, I'm really looking for a magazine piece in the style of something that would be in The Atlantic or The New Yorker--something pitched in an ~intellectual way. It could be a profile or a think piece -- as one would imagine from the Wakanda & Ta-Nehisi Coatesor T'Challa & Ta-Nehisi Coates groups-- or it could be about a particular event, especially if you are looking at the T'Challa & Barack Obama/Donald Trump groups. If you take the Donald Trump route, I'd prefer if article was pretty focused on the Wakanda/T'Challa interaction as opposed to being an overarching critique of the administration--of course, you can tie it into a critique, but try to avoid writing a polemic about Trump with a paragraph about Wakanda. With Obama, I think it would be pretty sweet actually to riff on the place of Obama as this ~Neo-Liberal Black Man and how that relates to the place of T'Challa in the world. Where it makes sense temporally, please bring in discussions of Killmonger and the new Wakandan outreach. That would be really cool.

I'd also love for Wakandan takes on any of the relevant people. What are the magazine articles in Wakanda about Trump or Obama? Does TNC get a profile in a glossy Wakandan magazine? What is the review of Between the World and Me in Birnin Zana's best magazine? A particularly cool take would be to look at Wakandans thinking about the role of diasporic writers such as TNC in unpacking what it means to be Black.

In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Interviews
This one is pretty straightforward! Ta-Nehisi Coates interviewing T'Challa! That's amazing. I'd love to read that. Or, if you'd like, I'm sure it'd be pretty awesome to have someone--doesn't have to be a real person--interview T'Challa and Obama/Trump together. Another cool thing would be people interviewing TNC about Wakanda revealing itself.

In-Universe Publication - Alternate Version of Existing Historical Text
Between the World and Me, The Beautiful Struggle, and We Were Eight Years in Power come to mind immediately, but feel free to branch out. It doesn't just have to be something by TNC. Do you have a favorite piece about Obama's legacy or the implication of Trump's election that would be radically different in light of Wakanda revealing itself? I'd love to read it.

In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Speech
Did T'Challa give a speech referencing Trump's election? Did Obama or Trump give a speech about Wakanda revealing itself? I'd love to read it.

In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Letters
This one probably applies most to T'Challa and Obama/TNC (I cannot imagine Trump is a very good personal correspondent).

Examples of Ta-Nehisi Coates writing that might be helpful:

Coates, Ta-Nehisi. 2008. The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood.

Coates, Ta-Nehisi. 2015. Between The World and Me.

Coates, Ta-Nehisi. 2017. We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy.

Request 3: Marvel Cinematic Universe
James "Bucky" Barnes, Group: HYDRA, In-Universe Publication - Technical Manual, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Sensitivity Policy, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Sexual Harassment Policy, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Mission Debrief/Transcript, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Paperwork, In-Universe Social Media and Communication - Email Chain, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Complaint Form, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Employee Evaluation, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Employment Application, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Institutional Incident Report, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Inter-Office Memos, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Institutional By-Laws, In-Universe Publication - Safety Instructions

I'm not going to deal with these individual tags separately, because I mostly have the same thing I want to say about them all. I want to see the bureaucratic detritus of the Winter Soldier. Feel free to make this as dark or as Trash-Party-inflected as you want. I'd love for it to be comic, but it can also just be horrifying or sickening. I have basically no DNWs, squeaks, or triggers here: go wild. Present what you think is the most realistic take on HYDRA by-laws and institutional forms, or present what would have to be the case if the HTP-fic of the universe is on to something.

Request 4: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Group: Wakandan Community Center in Oakland, Group: Wakanda (MCU), Group: Black Panthers (MCU), T'Challa (MCU), Erik Killmonger (MCU), Group: Shuri & T'Challa (MCU), In-Universe Publication - Academic Paper, In-Universe Publication - Constitution, In-Universe Publication - Political Pamphlet, In-Universe Publication - Travel Guide, In-Universe Media and Online - Conspiracy Theories, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Letters to the Editor, In-Universe Publication - Activist Pamphlet

As you might be able to tell from this signup in general, I'm fascinated by Wakanda and the politics/history/interaction of Wakanda and the world. I suggested a bunch of different tags that I found interesting, but the main goal is to explore interesting political moments with these characters and this place.

In general, go wild with this--I've put some random thoughts, but I haven't had a chance to go in detail and I feel bad about it, so I can say sincerely that I want whatever you want to do with these tags. I'm equally as interested in tags I said things about and tags that I didn't.

My only real DNW is mundane AUs -- canon divergence is okay, but I basically want the premise to remain the same: Afro-futurist African country and all.

In-Universe Publication--Academic Paper
I would bet all I got that in the MCU basically every journal that talks about Black Diaspora or Africana Studies had a special edition devoted to Wakanda as soon as T'Challa gave his speech to the UN. How is it interpreted in the context of things scholars find interesting? Does someone write an article comparing T'Challa's speech to the UN to various pan-Africanists? Does someone make an argument about what Wakanda means for the context of Blackness, given that a Black country is the most powerful in the world? What are the articles about the effects of their intervention? What's the "ten years later" journal article look like? Feel free to write a collection of abstracts for this, too--that would be pretty cool.

In-Universe Publication - Constitution
Yeah this one is born of me trying to work out exactly what the structure of Wakandan governance is. Interesting things to think about: likely, the constitutional form that they used would be significantly different than a Western one. In general, the way that Wakanda is constructed is as-if an African country was to develop over the last four hundred years without devastating violence and with a robust internal intellectual culture. This has the specific effect is that unlike most post-colonial African countries, their constitution (if they have one) would not have been written in direct response to Western legal order post-independence, which means it probably looks very different.

Or it doesn't exist! It is possible that a constitution doesn't exist in a form we recognize. In that case, write me about how they understand the constitution of their state. What is the basis of their legal order? It seems to me to be very likely that they have some sort of formal legal order, given the premise that they are the coallition of several distinct tribes. Real world examples of similar, non-European structures are the Iraquois Confederacy/Haudenosaunee and the United Arab Emirates. (UAE is a particularly interesting example because they are a monarchy to this day and they also arguably escaped most of the impacts of colonization). Lots of negotiation was probably necessary in figuring how to make this work.

Request 5: Marvel Cinematic Universe
group: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers (MCU), Poetry - Elegy, In-Universe Personal Documents - Poetry, In-Universe Personal Documents - Letters, In-Universe Personal Documents - Diary/Journal, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Therapist's Notes

The thing I'm really looking for here is some good old-fashioned angst and pining. I love the idea of writing letters that have to be seen by censors, or a journal where one or both of them feel the need to be somewhat elliptical in case it is found. In terms of the therapist notes, I would love to read Steve's therapist after he gets out of the ice or Bucky's therapist as he is recovering from the Winter Soldier. In general, anything shippy that really explores their century-long love for each other is exactly what I am looking for.

For the poetry, I requested elegy because if anyone deserves an elegy about them, it is Steve and Bucky. They have the overly dramatic love story that seems to really compell it. For in-universe poetry written by the character, I think it would be fun to see the poetry they write for each other--good or bad, depending on what you want to do with it.

I just love this ship--it's really the OTP of my heart--and I like just about every variation of it. You can't go wrong with the amount of angst or pining or drama or any individual interpretation, as long as they end up together and loving one another.

DNW: mundane AUs, Steve going back in time like he did in Endgame, poly. Past ships for either of them are fine, but endgame should be Steve/Bucky


Request 6: Crossover Fandom
Group: Black Panthers (MCU) & The Black Panther, Party Group: Wakanda (MCU) & Frantz Fanon (Philosophy RPF), Group: Wakanda (MCU) & Amílcar Cabral (Philosophy RPF), Group: Wakanda & James Baldwin (RPF), Group: Erik Killmonger (MCU) & Erik Lehnsherr (Any Version), In-Universe Publication - Activist Pamphlet, In-Universe Publication - Philosophy Paper, In-Universe Publication - Academic Paper, In-Universe Publication - Alternate Version of Existing Historical Text, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Speech, In-Universe Publication - History Book, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Letters, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Letters to the Editor, In-Universe Publication - Magazine Article

DNW: mundane AUs

In general, go wild with this--I've put some random thoughts, but I haven't had a chance to go in detail and I feel bad about it, so I can say sincerely that I want whatever you want to do with these tags. I might add some more stuff later, but the general thought is that I really love the politics of Wakanda and Killmonger and would love to see things that explore those politics in the context of real-world struggles.

Baldwin in particular was commissioned to write a series of pieces about Africa for the New Yorker in 1962. He never did. But what if he did and it was actually about Wakanda and then ended up deciding that the world shouldn't know about it yet? Alternately, maybe Wakanda decides to use Baldwin as a way to come out, in support of decolonizing movements around the world/the American Civil Rights movements.

Resources for Baldwin that might be helpful:
Dagmawi Woubshet; James Baldwin’s Late Encounters with Africa. Nka 1 November 2018; 2018 (42-43): 222–232. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/10757163-7185893

Request 7: Hannibal (TV)
Hannibal Lecter (TV), Bedelia Du Maurier, Will Graham (TV), In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Therapist's Notes

This one is very straightfoward--I'd love to see Hannibal's notes about Will and Bedelia's notes about Hannibal. Feel free to set it at any point in canon. Feel free to make any combination of these ships! I don't mind if there is very naughty therapist behavior in regards to boundaries.

I think it would be interesting to try and tell a story that would work in "normal" fanfic form through the medium of notes. What that means is like, want it to be an A/B/O story? Sure, great. Want it to be a canon-divergent AU where Will and Abigail join Hannibal to be the murder family? Awesome. Want it to accompany canon and add an extra insight into these character's thoughts? Also cool.

DNWs: infantilism, any au where Hannibal doesn’t kill and eat people.

Request 8: Original Work
Trope: Soulmate Marks, Trope: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, In-Universe Publication - Textbook, In-Universe Publication - History Book, In-Universe Publication - Alternate Version of Existing Historical Text, In-Universe Publication - Self-Help Book Excerpt, In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents - Sexual Harassment Policy

With this one, let your imagination be your guide. I am curious to know whatever fridge horror, wacky scenario, or weird implications of these tropes you can think of. Do you have a particular historical incident that would have been different if there was A/B/O? Write the history book excerpt. What is the A/B/O equivalent of your body, your selves? Is there a historical trend to the types of things that show up as soulmate marks over the centuries? What is the first recorded soulmate mark? What are cultural practices built up around soulmate marks? What does religion look like in this world? What are standard sit-com tropes? What happens if you meet your soulmate and they're severely impaired such that a consensual adult relationship is impossible? Idk, I'm just riffing -- honestly I regret not selecting way more tags for this one. Feel free to expand it out to basically any version of In-Universe Pub/ In-Universe Professional and Academic Documents you want to explore.

No real DNWs here-- if you think something fucked up or weird fits the world-building, go for it.