They write complex analytical essays known as meta, deconstructing the show’s mythology, examining its metaphors, and taking episodes apart moment by moment to dig for deeper meaning.
2014, Jay Schnorrer, "Adding to Narration and The Johnlock Conspiracy – The Meaning of Digital Media for BBC's Sherlock", paper submitted to Freie Universität Berlin (link):
Many metas on Tumblr incorporate GIFs of scenes they are referencing as well as screencaps.
2015, Kristen J. Warner, "ABC's Scandal and Black Women's Fandom", in Cupcakes, Pinterest, and Ladyporn: Feminized Popular Culture in the Early Twenty-First Century (ed. Elana Levine), page 38:
For example, imagining a peripheral Black female character as the lead, or writing "meta" about the ways the series depicts woman of color, or even discussing within the group how the dearth of roles is emblematic of Black women's place in society are all part of what make an interpretative as well as a fan community.
2016, Kathleen Smith, The Fangirl Life: A Guide to All the Feels and Learning How to Deal, page 31:
Beatrice finds herself writing nasty replies to Sherlock metas on Tumblr when she disagrees with them, and her follower count has been dropping every day.
2017, Francesca Coppa, The Fanfiction Reader: Folk Tales from the Digital Age, page 1:
More people than ever participate in some form of organized fan activity like reading or writing fanfiction, creating fan art, making fan films or vids, organizing wikis, collecting merchandise, writing meta, doing cosplay—or if they don’t do these things themselves, they likely know someone who does.
2018, Melanie E. S. Kohnen, "Tumblr Pedagogies", in A Companion to Media Fandom and Fan Studies (ed. Paul Booth), page 351:
Another Tumblr user reposted this piece of fanart and expanded the drawing's provocation into a meta post about the significance of imagining Steve Rogers as bisexual, focusing on the question, "why are there so few bisexual characters in comics and the media at large?"
2018, Sarah Leiser, "Throne of Fans: Examining the Roles of Feminism, Platform and Community in an Online Fandom", thesis submitted to the University of Denver, page 84:
Fans create their own stories and media representation through fan fiction. They challenge the feminism in the [Sarah J. Maas] books through discussions and metas.
2018, Jolie Christine Matthews, "A Past That Never Was: Historical Poaching in Game of Thrones Fans' Tumblr Practices", The Journal of International Media and Culture, Volume 16, Issue 3:
ASOIAFuniversity is, in its own words, "A collection of metas (critical essays or analysis), gathered from across tumblr, about George R.R. Martin's book series A Song of Ice and Fire (ASOIAF) and its television adaptation Game of Thrones."
2020, Elizabeth Minkel, quoted in "Under the Radar: A Conversation about Tumblr in the Public Sphere", in A Tumblr Book: Platform and Cultures (eds. Allison McCracken, Alexander Cho, Louisa Stein, and Indira Neill Hoch), page 64:
It wasn’t until I dug into post-season-3 Sherlockmeta in January of 2014 that I started to encounter "the Discourse."
2022, Francesca Coppa, Vidding: A History, page 138:
These analytical conversations—what fans call meta—also took place on the VIDDER mailing list started by Chicago Loop member tzikeh in July 1997.
2023, Abby Marsh & Ada Lerner, "Privacy Norms of Transformative Fandom: A Case Study of an Activity-Defined Community", Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, Volume 8, Issue CSCW1, page 6:
They represent a way for fans to talk about their experiences of fandom, and in the particular case of metas about fandom communities as comprised our sample, they are often explicit in both speaking to fans from multiple different fandoms and in seeking an audience of fans interested in a generalized discussion of fandom.
