slanhood en · NOUN
Pronunciation
- /ˈslænhʊd/ (General-American, Received-Pronunciation)
- (Southern-England) audio
Etymology
From slan (“fan of science fiction”) + -hood (suffix denoting a condition or state of being). Slan is from the title of the science fiction novel Slan (1940) by Canadian-born author A. E. van Vogt (1912–2000), about persecuted – yet physically, mentally and morally superior – telepathic mutant humans.
Meanings
-
(dated, slang, uncountable) The state of being a science fiction fan.
In the specific focus of providing a reference who can verify your tenured slanhood to the administrators, let's set the record straight and let's get very real and very clear about something here.
1997 October 29, Dave Locke, “Re: The Good Ol’ ‘Write-In’ Ballot”, in rec.arts.sf.fandom (Usenet), retrieved 16 Nov 2016, message-ID <34567d4e.63131406@news.pipeline.com>:This sense of difference was summed up in the well-known fan slogan that serves as an epigraph to this section, "Fans are slans." The Fancyclopedia describes the importance of this notion of "slanhood": [...]
2002, Justine Larbalestier, “Faithful to Thee, Terra, in Our Fashion”, in The Battle of the Sexes in Science Fiction (Wesleyan Early Classics of Science Fiction), Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, →ISBN, page 35:Because the central character in the story [Slan (1940) by A. E. van Vogt] was a youth in unsympathetic surroundings, and because of the obvious similarities to fans' dreams of greatness, the unserious claim to slanhood has become the Third Fandom parallel to the Second Fandom's half-serious Star-Begotten claims.
1944, John Bristol Speer, “slan”, in Fancyclopedia, Los Angeles, Calif.: Forrest J[ames] Ackerman, →OCLC, archived from the original on 21 Apr 2020, page 81, column 1:Believe you me, there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth amongst the other members of the class. But I happily wallowed in my slanhood.
2005 November 22, “Cliffy”, “My Students Can’t Name 3 First Amendment Rights: Sad or Normal?”, in Straight Dope Message Board, The Straight Dope, archived from the original on 16 Jul 2018:
Relateds
fans are slans · slan · slannish · slanshack · slan center