by Samantha Tynes
What is a geek? That's a question I roll around in my head every so often, and every time I do I get a different answer from myself. Ask anyone and they’ll have a different answer from another person. A geek is extraordinarily hard to pin down. I mean, sure, sometimes you can spot them in a crowd like some geeky version of Where's Waldo, but more and more the “definition” of geek is becoming more spread out. Don’t get me wrong, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. I love it, I think it’s great. The varied nature of our community is amazing.
I thought I'd ask some of the other folks here at DC Geeks what they thought while I tried to pin the answer down myself.
A Tribe Called Geek by Scooter
"Since DC Geeks was started, I get this question all the time. The whole "what the hell is a geek anyway" has to come up once every other week now. You'd think I'd have a better answer by now. I don't. I wish I did. If our entire subculture could be summed up into a tidy little package of terminology it would make it so much easier to describe to people what we're doing. Who we're talking to or who we're trying to build a community of.
I see geeks as a type of tribe. Sure we don't live in the same area, believe the same things, or many of the other things we think of when we hear the word tribe. We have chieftains (like Wil Wheaton, Penny Arcade, Joss Whedon, etc), we have large tribal gatherings (ComicCon, PAX, Dragoncon, etc...), and we even ostracize people we believe have done wrong to the tribe (Ocean Marketing Craziness or George Lucas).
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| (Image: Wikimedia Commons) He can sense your hate. |
The Far End of the Spectrum of Fans and Geeks by George Roland
So what, exactly is a geek? Well, I am. If you’re reading this article, I’m guessing you are. Most people can name at least a few high profile geeks. Joss Whedon, J.J. Abrams, George Lucas, George Romero, Gary Gygax, Wil Wheaton, Felicia Day… the list could go on. So what do these (seemingly very different) people have in common?
Ultimately it’s a love for the weird, the occult, the hidden, the offbeat. Geekery takes all manner of forms - from steampunk to zombies, from lightsabers to katanas, from dragons to Ewoks. A geek is someone who loves what they love, despite (or maybe because) it’s out of the mainstream.
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| Legos let your geekdom go deeper. (Image: Flickr) |
For example, what’s the difference between a Star Wars fan and a Star Wars geek? A fan can tell you that Admiral Akbar was a Mon Calamari. A geek can tell you that Mon Calamari come from the planet Dac and that Admiral Akbar personally designed the B-wing fighter, which is only seen in Episode VI at the Battle of Endor but is a playable spacecraft in the second expansion to the Star Wars: X-Wing computer game from 1993.
It is that level of love, of passion, of borderline fanaticism that really divides geeks and casual fans of geekery. Of course, this rule isn’t all-inclusive. You can be a geek in one subject and a casual fan of another. So are you still a geek? Of course you are.“But George,” I can hear you saying, “I’m a geek and my fandom isn’t part of the ‘normal’ geek community!”
“Not so,” I reply. There’s no such thing as the “normal geek community.” The DC Geeks scene has taught me that; no matter how odd the topic there are people out there who meet up, discuss it, love it, and want to bring it to the masses. If you feel like your fandom isn’t getting the attention it deserves, talk to us about it!
And that, of course, is really the point of this article. What makes a geek? The community. Being able to engage with other people and talk about what you love. After all, what’s the point of loving something if you don’t want to share it?
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