Not Billington, not Zoella, and Definitely not a ‘Fangirl’: Social Distinction within Communities of Amateur Theatre Critics

Abstract

In theatre criticism, the lines between professional and amateur have softened considerably since the turn of the twenty-first century, with much attention – academic and journalistic – given to the impact of amateur theatre criticism on theatre-making and marketing, on newspapers, and on theatre scholarship. So far, however, the voices and perspectives of amateur critics themselves have largely been absent from research. To rectify this absence, this study applies sociological concepts from Pierre Bourdieu and Sarah Thornton to thirty-five interviews undertaken with practising theatre bloggers in the United Kingdom in order to understand their relative positions within three intersecting fields: the field of professional theatre reviewing; the field of online ‘influencing’; and the smaller and more specific field of ‘amateur’ theatre criticism. Here, the study undertaken finds a significant proportion of practitioners using the counterpoint of the ‘fangirl’ – whose practices of appreciation and etiquette are widely disparaged – to advocate for their own purportedly more intellectual and professional approaches to critique.