Passing through: popular media tourism, pilgrimage and narratives of being a fan

This chapter presents the figure of the flaneur, the passionate wanderer emblematic of nineteenth-century literary culture, to provide a conceptual framework through which to understand how fans relate to, interact with, and pass through spaces of popular culture. The flaneur is personified by the act of "passing by" – walking, wandering, window shopping in the city. The contemporary movie tour offered in so many cities around the world personifies this aspect of the fan as flaneur, enunciating their fandom through movement around spaces and taking photographs. The chapter outlines how media fan tourism is about passing through different tourist spaces and finding meaning in the act of being present, taking photos, and performing as a fan within those spaces. Fan tourism is an act of passing through space; the fan pilgrimage is characterized by physical movement between familiar spaces and venerated places of popular culture.