Fandom as Idenity and Community

A type of media that I am not a fan of, but my brother is would be the show E.R. Recently, E.R. just aired the final show for the last season. Ever since I can remember my brother has been a huge fan of the show that has been on for the past 12 years. My brother and his friends formed their own kind of community around this show. Every night that it was on they would sit around the television and watch the show while discussing with each other what was going and how they felt about that particular episode. Now, my brother has also formed a certain identity with this show. The other day my mom and brother were talking to me about the final show of E.R. and my brother made the comment that he wanted to go to medical school. You must know my brother to understand he would not be the medical school type. He struggled through high school barely passing math and science, which is a large part of the medical field. The reason he had considered making this life change was all because of the show. He said that he would love to be just like the people on the show and take care or gun shot wounds, burns, bleeding, and everything else. I was very interested in the fact that just two years ago he hated school and barely made it through, but after being a part of this fandom that formed a community and new identity for him he wanted to make a whole life change. After hearing about this I realized the effect that not only media can have on us and our lives, but also what the actually involvement and dedication to this media can actually do to us.