sercon n.

a sercon fan; a sercon item, sercon activities

Fancyclopedia


SF Fandom

  • 1958 R. M. Holland Ghu’s Lexicon 13

    sercon…Originally the business or serious sessions at conventions. Now also applied to a fan who plays a ‘skeleton at the feast’™ role. One who discusses the sordid details of some fan activity instead of following the trufan motto: Let’s pretend they aren’t there and maybe they'll go away.

  • 1966 L. Carter Handy Phrase-Book in Fannish in Worlds of If Oct. 66/2 page image Lin Carter bibliography

    Let’s suppose your fan activities are confined to writing scholarly treatises on the Sources Used by H.P. Lovecraft in creating his Cthulhu Mythos…or dull articles on fannish history…. In this case, you may very well be dismissed as an eggheady old Sercon.

  • 1974 Fanzines in Focus in Science Fiction Monthly Nov. 12 page image

    Zenith was what is known as a ‘sercon’—a serious and constructive publication about sf.

  • 1991 L. Niven, J. Pournelle, & M. Flynn Fallen Angels 92 Larry Niven Michael F. Flynn Jerry Pournelle bibliography

    Chuck laughed. ‘Sercon,’ he explained. ‘˜Serious and constructive activities.’

  • 2007 T. A. Shippey Letter in Prolapse (#6) Apr. 33 page image Tom Shippey

    The sercons always seemed to have their eye on approval from some non-fan body, but I can’t think who that would be. The Arts Council? Were they worried about ‘reputability’, whatever that may be?

Research requirements

antedating 1958
Earliest cite

Ghu's Lexicon
Research History
Fred Galvin submitted a 1966 cite from Lin Carter's "Handy Phrase-Book in Fannish".

Last modified 2020-12-24 02:19:07
In the compilation of some entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries in OED.