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Eddie, you cut the part about slash fic being about same-sex pairings. Can I add that back, as it's an essential part of the definition? (Slash=guy on guy, generally, with femmeslash for girl on girl. Straight pairings are usually referred to as such, or as het fic. Fic about romantic pairings of any gender mix are shipping fic.)
Edited by NocturnaAsk ten members of fandom about the definition of slash fic, and it's safe to say nine of them will tell you that slash refers specifically to gay pairings, so for all intents and purposes it's an intrinsic part of the definition. For what it's worth.
I serve at the pleasure of President Pritchart.Urban Dictionary
agrees with Rose. Again, for what it's worth.
Humorously, dictionary.com gives the hilariously vague description "a genre of erotic fiction written by women, to appeal to women".
I never got why Slash specifically referred to same-sex pairings. If I recall correctly, the name comes from saying that it's from saying it's a "Bob/Charlie pairing" (in other words, "Bob slash Charlie") which seems just as applicable to heterosexual pairings.
I mean, I accept that it DOES. It's just so arbitrary.
Edited by Larkmarn Found a Youtube Channel with political stances you want to share? Hop on over to this page and add them.AFAIK Rose is right and Slash is gay/lesbian pairings. Het pairings are het/romance/whatever.
On empty crossroads, seek the eclipse -- for when Sol and Lua align, the lost shall find their way home.AFAIK, "slash" refers to same-sex pairings because the slash mark was first used to indicate a romantic pairing of Kirk and Spock, as opposed to the ampersand that indicated a story that focused on their friendship. So, Kirk/Spock (romantic) vs. Kirk&Spock (platonic). It wasn't until later (Mulder/Scully, I believe) that the slash was used for a het romantic pairing, and by that time the word "slash" meant "gay erotic fanfic". There are a few small fan communities where slash does mean any romantic pairing, but thanks to the Internet, the former meaning is predominant in fandom.
...well. Don't I sound like a pretentious twat.
I serve at the pleasure of President Pritchart.Fanlore has an extremely detailed article on slash, including a section on how it's been defined through the years: http://fanlore.org/wiki/Slash#Defining_Slash
However, most of the debate regarding what slash is and isn't mostly surrounds whether slash is necessarily non-canon, whether the participants have to be canonically straight to be slashed, or whether slash works are necessarily fanworks or can also be original works. Most fandoms agree at this point that "slash" refers exclusively to same-sex pairings (and, more specifically, M/M pairings, versus femslash for F/F pairings). Frankly, until this thread, I didn't know that anyone referred to het pairings as slash. They're a tiny, tiny minority in modern fandoms.

Slash Fic seems to be confusing itself in the description, first it says it comes from the show having a LGBT Demographic, but later on it says it comes from Girl-on-Girl is Hot and it's reverse.