Summary:
A small meta essay on the nature and stylization of ship names (in Asian and western fandoms), name order, and how I personally choose to name my pairings. Mature for frank sexual discussion, but no actual sex.
Notes:
Originally posted to Pillowfort in September 2020. Edited and re-uploaded to AO3 In January 2021, due to Pillowfort's down status during January and February. Re-uploaded to SCUMSUCK.com on May 30th, 2023.
Disclaimer: I don't care how you name your ship names, do whatever you want to do! Feel free to add any of your own observations or corrections, as I'm actually quite new to fandom and its history.
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I've noticed 5 types of ship names:
- CharacterA x Character B (eg. Scout x Spy)
- CharacterA/CharacterB also known as SLASH (Scout/Spy)
- CharacterACharacterB (eg. Scoutspy)
- Thematic nickname (eg. Cloak and Batter)
- CharacterACharacterBCharacterA for reversible pairings (ScoutSpyScout?!!?)
CharacterA x Character B & CharacterA/CharacterB is a bit more old school, and is how I remember people describing fics back in the Fanfiction dot net days. CharacterACharacterB is what became more popular in the tumblr days, probably because it's shorter and you can't have "/" in hashtags. Thematic nickname is cutesy and my friend group first noticed it in the Yugioh and Pokemon fandom (like Puzzleshipping). The modern form of eschewing the "-shipping" suffix and going straight to phrases seems to have become popular around the 2010's Tumblr era.
For 1, 2 & 3, I think a lot of western shippers don't remember or know about name orders! In Asian fandom, it's quite common for the ship to be interpreted differently depending on which character is first and second. The most basic explanation (lacks a lot of nuance!) is that the first name is the the top or dom, and the second name is the bottom or sub. I think that was a little more known in western fandom around the 2000's, as the ship wars over NaruSasu vs SasuNaru raged, but it's largely been thrown out in modern western shipping. I believe there's some use of CharacterACharacterBCharacterA (NaruSasuNaru) to try to "balance" things in the ship wars so there's no top/bottom connotation, but the names are very clunky to me. And there's still that one character sandwiched in the middle... it's not a very clean solution and I have no idea what to make of it honestly!
Some people tag both A/B and B/A for SFW works in which the artist has no bias, depicts them as reversible, or wants the viewer to interpret it in their own way. I occasionally tag both A/B and B/A like such, especially in works that muddle the domtop/subbottom dynamic.
From the Pixiv dictionary for リバ, (Riba or reverse), they acknowledge the differences in western naming:
There is something called a slash in the notation that is mainly used among rogue girls in English-speaking countries such as the West . (Examples of use: A/B, B/A, etc.) Overseas, there is the idea that "if the characters you like are in love with each other, it doesn't matter if they attack each other ."
The definition from Pixiv says that western rot fans don't care which position the characters are in, possibly because in the western queer community there's been a large push to excise placing personality traits on sexual position. I personally don't care for stereotyping personality traits on sexual position either, but I will fully admit I have preferences for submissive "older bottoms" as you may see in my personally most used tags...
Still, there is a lot of top/bottom discourse in both asian and western fandoms, and I don't care for any of it on either side. I'm personally 固定(kotei, fixed) for my most beloved pairings, because I project on them harder and have personal preferences. I admire people who are reversible with their pairings (switch). In fiction, writers can have sexual preferences. Whether a writer interprets a character as top/bottom doesn't matter to me. It only matters negatively to me if the writer demands that other bow to their interpretation, whether it's the age-old "bottoms have to be short and feminine!!!" stereotype that the gay community suffers from in real life, or if certain people demand that others have to be switches lest they be~unwoke~.
So! In my very small pocket of the TF2 fandom, SpyScout is the default naming for the Spy and Scout pairing, no matter who tops or bottoms. It just rolls off the tongue better. But I've intentionally been using the VERY much less common "ScoutSpy" to describe my depiction of the pairing, because I'm very knowingly going against the grain. The common dynamic for Scout and Spy is that Spy is "a perverted older man in a suit who lusts over and takes advantage of young, innocent dumbass". I'm not really a fan of that kink (it's quite a squick and possibly a trigger for me actually, and thank god for fans who tag ship names by dom/sub because it helps me avoid such content!), and I much prefer reversal of assumed dynamics. I'm intentionally using ScoutSpy to tag my art because I'm reversing the popular dynamic into "A young, perverted dumbass has the bodily autonomy to lust after an older man." It's not a form of activism. I do not care about top/bottom discourse. I just have my personal preferences, and like to make them clear to anyone who knows a little bit about name orders in pairings.
I usually draw Scout as the penetrative partner in my pornography of Scout & Spy, but I've also drawn Spy as the (submissive) penetrating one. Hell, 80% of my art of them is non-pornography! But I still want to depict Scout as the giver of affection, and Spy as the recipient of affection. The way I interpret name order is based off asian top/bottom naming, but it's evolved for me beyond how the characters have sex. I'm a huge fan of one-sided attraction and unrequited romance, so for me the CharacterACharacterB naming is most convenient to my specific needs.
The Thematic Nicknames are often of no use to me. No one can decide on one nickname to use. The nicknames are often biased based on someone's personal headcanons (eg. Cloak and Batter vs DADDY ISSUES lol), and they don't clearly denote the characters being depicted. And even for people who know the characters, can't tell what pairing the name is supposed to be for! There are some cute ones (Magic Missiles for SollyMera), but for the most part they're too confusing and clunky for my personal taste.
One of the very nice things about Thematic Nicknames however, is that there's no top/bottom denotation. Which can be very useful for my secondary pairings (in which I'm usually reversible). For example, DemoSolly is the more common CharacterACharacterB naming for Demoman and Soldier, but my headcanonz are that they don't even top or bottom and they just fumble around in the trenches. So Boots and Bombs may be a useful way for me to tag such art, without having to resort to DemoSollyDemo sorts of confusion.
How I name my character pairings has nothing to do with anyone else. In Asian fandoms, there can be quite violent kerfuffles over people mistagging their pairings because there's such an emphasis on organization. We're not in Asian fandom however (at least not most of the audience who are reading my English writing on a site that's hosted in the United States), and I know that many westerners don't want to abide by strict tagging that isn't necessarily helpful for their own organization. Everyone else can name their pairings however they like, it doesn't affect me! Even if the popular dynamic is something that discomforts me, I know how to mute people. I'd like everybody to please have fun with their own headcanons!
I like having my little abode in my personal character pairing tag that barely anyone else uses. But it does make me heart grow a little bit if I see someone else who likes the same HIGHLY SPECIFIC dynamic as I do for these characters, and if they know how the naming of the pairing can give off small subtleties. ScoutSpy rules!!
End Notes
Sources:
Pixiv. “リバ.” ピクシブ百科事典, Pixiv, 22 Nov. 2020, dic.pixiv.net/a/%E3%83%AA%E3%83%90.
Google Translated: "There is something called a slash in the notation that is mainly used among rogue girls in English-speaking countries such as the West . (Examples of use: A/B, B/A, etc.) Overseas, there is the idea that "if the characters you like are in love with each other, it doesn't matter if they attack each other .""Pixiv. “固定.” ピクシブ百科事典, Pixiv, 22 Nov. 2020, dic.pixiv.net/a/%E5%9B%BA%E5%AE%9A.