Apocrypha HrsfalogicaeChapter Three: Special Interest Groups: Their Significance and Limits In the first issue of HRSFA's newsletter, Hydrogen Band, Chaz English referred to Special Interest Groups, or SIGs, as "the lifeblood of the Harvard-Radcliffe Science Fiction Association." A similar view was put forth later by Gint Valinlis, the Association's second SIG coordinator (1988-90). Mr. English's comments were quite true at the time of his writing (December, 1987), though they are much less so now (June, 1992). When HRSFA was founded, five years ago, it was initially intended to serve as an umbrella organization for the various gaming campaigns, Doctor Who fans, costumers, and other sfrelated subgroups then existing and meeting on campus. It was, in other words, to be a means of providing official University affiliation, with all that entails (rooming and postering privileges, UC grants, and the respect of an otherwise-hostile world) to a number of small "organizations" which could not acquire such affiliation on their own. The only other real function of the Association as a whole (as far as your author can tell) was to serve as a social organization, an excuse for science fiction fans to get together every few weeks for food and conversation. By the end of its second year of existence, however, HRSFA had clearly become more than just an umbrella organization-it had acquired a loyal membership and an agenda of its own. I am not entirely sure why this transformation occurred; I suspect, though, that many of HRSFA's first members if not most of them were more interested in science fiction as a whole than in any particular subdivision of that genre, and therefore were more interested in joining and participating in the Association than one of its constituent SIGs. (A careful examination of HRSFA's early membership records should help confirm or disprove this theory.) Then, too, HRSFA's SIGs were never very powerful or demanding to begin with they were either too small (e.g. the Doctor Who SIG) or too non-cohesive (e.g. the Gaming SIG) to have much of an agenda. Meanwhile, by the spring of 1989 the Association had acquired significant resources (an office, money, etc.) of its own, and had undertaken several projects movie-screenings, a gaming marathon, a magazine, etc. which were too large for any one Special Interest Group to manage. Fusion magazine, for example, began life as a SIG; by 1989 it had grown into a concern of the Association as a whole, and its Editor-in-Chief had become a HRSFA officer (which is how matters currently stand). At the time of this writing, the Association's SIGs seem to function more as diversions than as essential parts of HRSFA. Nevertheless' Special Interest Groups continue to play a key role within the Association, and certainly should not be considered obsolete. Here are some of their less-obvious functions:
One caveat: Large-scale projects like the Gameathon, Masquerade, magazine, and so forth require staffs, not SIGs, to carry them out. Special Interest Groups can provide advice and manpower for the Association's activities a given SIG leader may even be in charge of such an activity but this should not be their sole, or even primary, function. And now... A (Partial) List o' HRSFA SIGs, Past and Present:Blake's Seven: A fairly ephemeral group, the Blake's Seven SIG met for about a year (1990-1) under the leadership of former Doctor Who SIG leader Sarah Kline. The SIG screened videotapes of the British science fiction series (which has not been broadcast in Boston recently) on a weekly basis; it has been dormant for some time now, though there is no reason why it couldn't be re-formed if there were a sufficient number of interested people. Comic Books: The chief function of the Comics SIG is to provide a forum for the discussion of mainstream (i.e. DC and Marvel), small-press, and imported comics and graphic novels plotlines, the relative merits of various writers and artists, upcoming new titles, how and why Tom Veitch totally destroyed Animal Man, and so forth. In addition, the leader of the Comics SIG is responsible (or has been since 1991, anyway) for selecting and obtaining titles for the Association's library of comics and graphic novels, and for overseeing HRSFA's comics swap, if any. The HRSFA Comics SIG met several times in 1988 and 1989 under the leadership of Rod Brown, though I'm not entirely certain what they discussed. In the fall of 1991, Matt Duhan became de facto SIG leader, though as of this writing the group has not met for several years. Doctor Who: This group significantly predates the establishment of HRSFA (as mentioned above), though like so many other SIGs it has been dormant for a couple of years. (This may have something to do with the fact that Dr. Who was cancelled by the BBC in 1989). The Doctor Who SIG met regularly in Dunster House (and, during its most recent year, in Lowell House) from around 1986 to 1990, showing videotaped episodes of the beloved and semi-eternal British science fiction series. In addition, in March of 1989 a group of HRSFA Whovians (yes, "Whovian" is the accepted name for a Doctor Who fan-go figure) trekked up to New Hampshire, under the leadership of Vice President Steve Sigel, to help a small public television station keep Doctor Who on the air (by serving as telethon volunteers). I do not know how much success they enjoyed-in fact, I am not altogether certain that this expedition ever got past the planning stages. It does, however, serve as an example of the kind of activity in which this SIG could involve itself (apart from watching old episodes of the program) if it were to re-form. HRSFAns interested in Doctor Who should also be aware of UNIT, an active, six-year-old fan club based in New England. Membership in UNIT is $10 per year. For more information, write to: The U.S. Branch of UNIT ("UNIT", by the way, stands for United Nations Intelligence Taskforce.) English-Elvish Orthography: A small SIG, comprised chiefly (if not exclusively) of Angela Winner and Kevin Wald, this group succeeded in its first goal producing a functional and accurate English-to-Elvish orthography in the fall of 1991. Plans to translate the HRSFA constitution into Elvish script are underway at the time of this writing, coincident, if not coordinate, with plans to translate the HRSFA constitution into heroic verse. Gaming: Like the Doctor Who SIG, this interest group precedes the establishment of the larger SF Association by a fair number of years; there have probably been active wargaming and roleplaying campaigns on the Harvard campus since these forms of recreation were invented. (One of the larger live-action roleplaying organizations, in fact the Society for Interactive Literature began as a Harvard student organization in the early 1980s.) The HRSFA Gaming SIG rarely meets as a whole, and in fact there has generally only been one significant member of this group (as far as the Association-at-large is concerned): the SIG leader. His responsibilities have included, or might include: maintaining an active database of gamers on campus and their individual interests (this has been the key function of the Gaming SIG leader since HRSFA's inception); keeping a record of campaigns and major sf gaming events at Harvard; organizing and supervising the annual Gameathon, as well as "random gaming" sessions at HRSFA general meetings; and overseeing HRSFA's gaming collection and submitting budget applications for new acquisitions. It is, obviously, not a small job, but the Gaming SIG is not a small group. (Furthermore, few, if any, of the Gaming SIG leader's responsibilities are especially arduous.) The Prisoner: This offbeat, timeless British television series has had a strong following among HRSFAns since the Association's early days. During HRSFA's first year, a showing of all seventeen episodes of The Prisoner that is, a Prisoner "orgy"-provoked a mundane bystander to ask the now-immortal question "A prisoner orgy? Is that legal?" (We still haven't come up with an answer to that one, by the way.) In the fall of 1990, the Association purchased a complete run of The Prisoner on videocassette, and Sean Williford, after taking custody of the tapes, formed an official Prisoner SIG. Mr. williford screened one or two episodes of the program, which attracted a fairly large audience, every weekend during the latter part of the '90-1 school year. He also acquired membership information from the official Prisoner fan club, Six of One, which, among other things, sells program-related insignia and paraphernalia. (Why am I not surprised?) Refreshments: This isn't really a SIG, since it doesn't have any members (beyond the SIG leader and his designated assistants), and since food isn't a special interest. The title of "Refreshments SIG leader" was adopted by Jonathan Kastin in 1989, after he assumed responsibility for procuring munchies (defined by West End Games as "edibles and potables of neqligible nutritional value") for the Association's general meetings. Mr. Kastin's successor, Kevin Wald, chose to retain this title despite a half-hearted attempt to change it to "Minister of Plenty." Thus it has acquired as much legitimacy as anything associated with HRSFA can. The official title of the Refreshments SIG leader's assistants, by the way, is "Grand Vizier." Keep it in mind. Star Trek: Since HRSFA's very first meeting occurred at the same time as the first episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1987, this SIG has been around for a fairly long time. It has not, however, been particularly cohesive, since the program is available to anyone with a television unlike Doctor Who or The Prisoner, which usually have to be viewed on videotape, and thus require some organization to watch. The main function of the Star Trek SIG, therefore, is to keep Star Trek fans ("Trekkies," if you prefer I don't) informed of developments in the show, and to help HRSFAns attend local conventions and events. An example: in December of 1991 a number of HRSFAns attended the Boston opening of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. This is the sort of activity the Star Trek SIG leader could organize. (Another possibility: the Star Trek SIG could maintain a video library of popular episodes from both the original series ["Amok Time" comes to mind] and TNG.) HRSFAn Star Trek fans should also be aware of the existence of the Boston Star Trek Association, a local fan group which holds monthly meetings and an annual convention ("The Bash"), among other things. A one-year membership with the BSTA costs $15.00. For more information, write to: The Boston Star Trek Association Tea & Coffee: Not to be confused with the Refreshments SIG, the Tea & Coffee SIG is a mysterious, perhaps non-existent cabal of caffeine-worshippers organized by Matthew Ender cat 1990. Its raison d'etre is unknown, at least to me; perhaps it's iust an Alaska thing. Writers': The Writers' SIG was founded by yours truly in October of 1988, and has met at least several times a year since then. It has chiefly served as a writers' workshop, and SIG members have edited and commented on nearly forty stories and poems since the group's inception. Submissions to the SIG can be (and have been) subsequently submitted to Fusion or other magazines (on- and off-campus), entered in local writing contests, or simply handed over to one's Expository Writing teacher for execration and a passing grade. The SIG has also served as a forum for discussion of sf- and reading-related issues and ideas; several present HRSFA institutions, such as the reading library and the adventus and servatus horæ ceremonies, were developed at Writers' SIG meetings. Other possible functions of the Writers' SIG include: inviting prominent sf writers and editors to Harvard to give speeches or readings (as Ellen Kushner was in 1991), keeping track of local writers' workshops and "serious" sf conventions (known by science fiction fans as "sercons") and helping HRSFAns participate in them, and keeping interested HRSFAns informed about the science fiction writing courses offered by Harvard (if any) and MIT (for which Harvard students can cross-register. A word of advice: the interests of Fusion magazine and the Writers' SIG, while they coincide at many points, are not identical. While the Editor-in-Chief of Fusion can and should solicit submissions to that magazine from the Writers' SIG, he or she should not feel too put-out if SIG members wish to seek another means of publishinq their work. Random Things: The SIGs listed above are, obviously, not the only such groups which could exist within HRSFA. Other SIG possibilities include:
Another possibility (were it not for the prohibitions against such SIGs in Article VI of the HRSFA constitution) is the VALU, or Virgins Against Lonely Unicorns, SIG, whose slogan, "Get your fucking head off my lap," has already inflamed millions. Well, dozens, anyway. The origins of the term "SIG," finally, are unknown to me, but I suspect the word comes from computer networking and electronic bulletin board parlance. Back to Index |