Empty genres; or what to do with all those -punks?

[hildea]

Originally Posted by haertig

So it works both ways. Too many oddly named sub-genres can be a turn off as well as an invitation. Had I been asked how to describe Jim Butcher's work, I would have called it something like "Crime/Mystery, with a magical twist". "Urban Fantasy" seems like an artificial jumble of unrelated words to me. An attempt to distinguish the genre as something different from all the rest, but doing so in a relatively meaningless way. Basically, it is just plain old Crime/Mystery. With a twist of the occult added. It's not really a "new genre" IMHO.

Urban Fantasy isn't Crime/Mystery with an occult twist, it's more like contemporary novel with an occult or supernatural twist. It can be crime, but it can also be romance, or family drama, or "someone is trying to destroy the world (or the city or something) and we need to stop them", or something else.

I agree that the genre name isn't very good. But then I don't think "science fiction" is a very good name either. I understand the problem you mention, but it seems to me that -- rather than hoping that the weird genre names drop out of use -- it would be better if you (and others) learn that good books can have weird genre names attached to them.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by hildea

I understand the problem you mention, but it seems to me that -- rather than hoping that the weird genre names drop out of use -- it would be better if you (and others) learn that good books can have weird genre names attached to them.

Hear, hear.

[haertig]

Originally Posted by hildea

Adding a lot of nonsense characters to LGBT+ seems awfully like mocking to me. If I'm wrong, and that's a real acronym, I'd appreciate a link to help me learn better.

You are getting closer to understanding my point, but you're not quite there yet. I will try to restate it slightly differently: There are so many different genres of books, and letters in the gender/sex alphabet that I was using as a comparison, that even someone claiming to be part of the group they represent doesn't know if what I typed is real or not (e.g., your admission of "If I'm wrong...") This is a fine example to illustrate my point that there are too many subclassifications to be useful to the general public. Many people not personally invested in one of these book genres, or gender/sex alphabet letters as a comparison, don't know what it's supposed to mean. Too many subclassifications to remember, thus not very useful. Which was the point.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by haertig

This is a fine example to illustrate my point that there are too many subclassifications to be useful to the general public.

No. You've only illustrated that you feel there are too many subclassifications to be useful to you. Besides... they don't all need to be useful to the general public to still be useful (and even valuable) to many.

It's not a requirement that the general reading public have a complete understanding of what every single subgenre or subclassification means. Nor should the general reading public need to fall back to some sort of least common denominator approach to genre simply because some choose to let themselves be overwhelmed by variety/change.

[haertig]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

No. You've only illustrated that you feel there are too many subclassifications to be useful to you.

Well, of course. That's because it is MY opinion. YOUR opinion is obviously different. We're having a discussion. So that pretty much means I state MY opinion and you state YOUR opinion. We're just bantering back and forth here, with lots of people stating THEIR opinions. Were you expecting an exchange different from that?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by haertig

Well, of course. That's because it is MY opinion. YOUR opinion is obviously different. We're having a discussion. So that pretty much means I state MY opinion and you state YOUR opinion.

Sorry. But which part of "illustrate my point that there are too many subclassifications to be useful to the general public" suggests you were only speaking for yourself, and not, in fact, the general public?

Originally Posted by haertig

We're just bantering back and forth here, with lots of people stating THEIR opinions. Were you expecting an exchange different from that?

At a minimum, I was expecting an exchange where people make at least a small effort to say what they mean.

[haertig]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

...which part of "illustrate my point that there are too many subclassifications to be useful to the general public" suggests you were only speaking for yourself...

The part where I said my point, highlighted above for your convenience.

Your point is that there are NOT too many subclassifications to be of use to the general population, my point is that there ARE. We are bringing up differing points, based on the way we see things differently. I am obviously speaking for myself, just as you are speaking for yourself. The explanation really can't get any more "duh" than that.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by haertig

The part where I said my point, highlighted above for your convenience.

Yeah. Nice try.

Originally Posted by haertig

Your point is that there are NOT too many subclassifications to be of use to the general population...

Nope. Allow me to return the favor of highlighting for the sake of "convenience". It IS rather fun!

No. You've only illustrated that you feel there are too many subclassifications to be useful to you. Besides... they don't all need to be useful to the general public to still be useful (and even valuable) to many.

[haertig]

I shall leave you to argue with yourself.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by haertig

I shall leave you to argue with yourself.

You didn't think this was going to be the type of exchange where you get to completely misrepresent someone else's point while accusing others of the same did you?

[hildea]

Originally Posted by haertig

You are getting closer to understanding my point, but you're not quite there yet. I will try to restate it slightly differently: There are so many different genres of books, and letters in the gender/sex alphabet that I was using as a comparison, that even someone claiming to be part of the group they represent doesn't know if what I typed is real or not (e.g., your admission of "If I'm wrong...") This is a fine example to illustrate my point that there are too many subclassifications to be useful to the general public. Many people not personally invested in one of these book genres, or gender/sex alphabet letters as a comparison, don't know what it's supposed to mean. Too many subclassifications to remember, thus not very useful. Which was the point.

I see I should be less subtle when I try to be snarky. To be more explicit: I'm sure your letter salad was pulled out of thin air. I still think that amounts to mockery.

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

No. You've only illustrated that you feel there are too many subclassifications to be useful to you. Besides... they don't all need to be useful to the general public to still be useful (and even valuable) to many.

Yes, exactly! I don't get why haertig seems to misunderstand you.

haertig, say someone coins a new term for a subgenre today. * picks up a dictionary, opens it at random, looks for an adjective... OK, "herbal" * Say someone decides that -- hmm, herbal literature, herbal fantasy, herbal crime, herbal horror, that's nicely alliterative, let's go with that -- "herbal horror" is a useful term to describe something that is, to them, an interesting subset of books. I've no idea what kind of books that would be. I don't read much horror, so odds are that's not a genre for me, but if I stumbled across a blog post describing this genre I'd be intrigued enough to skim it. If it sounded like something I want to read, I'd have a new search term when looking for books. If not, I'd ignore it. If I searched for books some other way, and found a book which was tagged with "herbal horror" in addition to terms I knew and liked, I wouldn't let an unfamiliar term keep me from reading it, although the "horror" part might make me look a bit closer before I chose to buy it.

Same with gender and sexuality. There are terms I don't know for some of the subtler nuances of those. But as long as those terms are useful to some people, they don't need to be useful to me.

When I come across an unfamiliar term, I'll either ask, look it up, try to infer the meaning from context, or ignore it. Its existence doesn't harm me.

[MGlitch]

Not understanding what a particular sub genre is, in particular Urban Fantasy which is fairly well defined, in a day and age where the majority of us have neigh unlimited access to the internet is on the person not the sub genre. And let’s please put aside the counters of there are people without smartphones and good internet, smartphones have become the defacto mobile phone you have to go out of your way for a dumb phone. As to internet even back in the 1400 baud modem days looking up words wasn’t particularly difficult and most of those afflicted with sub genres as a concern are going to have access to far faster connections be it on a phone or computer.

Having 6 billion sub genres would also not hinder the general public for the simple fact that they don’t ever need to interact with those sub genres only those seeking out books that would fit in the sub genre and those trying to sell a book that fits would actually need to. It’s not like those who want more sub genres are insisting that physical stores be broken down to represent them (though I know BN did at one point have cozy mystery within mystery), so knowledge of the large umbrella terms of fantasy or science fiction would still expose those browsing shelves in a physical store to the same books. Meanwhile Digital stores don’t suffer the same limitation as physical, a single book can be in however many sub genres it needs to be.

I will say that the Amazon example is one I’d think is useless because at that point you’re splitting hairs to try and make a difference. But grimdark vs noblebright have clear differences.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by hildea

herbal horror, that's nicely alliterative

Not in American.

[DiapDealer]

Reminds me of those 70s Glade commercials.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by hildea

...it seems to me that -- rather than hoping that the weird genre names drop out of use -- it would be better if you (and others) learn that good books can have weird genre names attached to them.

Don't presume too much about me. I wouldn't avoid (or purchase) any book solely based on genre tags attached to them (except 'herbal horror'. Maybe I should start up herbal horror fandom). Reading your own post, it sounds like you wouldn't either. So in the end, those sub-sub-subgenres are of limited to no use.