"Shipping," or "ship," is an important aspect of fan culture and serves as the important backbone of several fandoms across the internet. To "ship" a character with another is to imagine (and to hope!) that the two enter a relationship with each other.

This practice may seem odd to someone unfamiliar with internet fan (and Stan) communities, but studying the history of the term and its use will help shine some light on why shipping culture is so prolific in every fan community.

Where Does The Idea Of 'Shipping' Come From?

The practice of shipping two fictional characters with each other precedes the use of the term "shipping" itself. Fans of Jane Austen would know the historic influence of her works, which get spun into remixed media endeavors to this day. But Austen's characters were always so popular that fanzines and fanfictions reimagining her characters in different pairings can be traced back to as early as 1913.

Where Did The Term 'Shipping' Originate?

The term "shipping" likely originates from the term "relationshipper," with both words being used interchangeably in Usenet Newsgroups back in the 1990s. One of the earliest archives examples of the word "shipping" being used can be traced back to a May 1996 post on a small X-Files newsgroup, where someone complained about "relationshippers" misunderstanding Mulder and Scully's dynamic.

Where Do Most 'Shippers' Reside Today?

As users migrated from Usenet to the internet in the 2000s, so did "shippers." LiveJournal was a website that played a large role in popularising shipping fanfictions, with a large community of fanfiction writers and shippers engaging with each others' work in the early 2000s.

By 2005, "shipping" had its own Urban Dictionary entry. Tumblr is another website most people understand to be a hotbed of shipping culture on the modern internet. Several terms integral to "shipping" culture can be traced back to LiveJournal and Tumblr, such as headcanon and OTP

What Is Some Common Shipping Terminology?

OTP or One True Pairing is a phrase you might often read in communities that discuss shipping. Someone might say, "Harry Potter and Ginny are my personal OTP!" which means that the two characters are the commentator's ideal end-all, be-all pair. A fan's OTP is the pairing they invest the majority of their time and emotion into. But one's OTP may not necessarily be canonical, or even sensical, but it remains at the center of the adamant fan's shipping devotion nonetheless.

"Crack pairings" refer to a type of coupling that is considered bizarre or absurd due to various reasons, such as lack of relevancy in the canon or discrepancy in age or species of the characters that are involved. The name comes from the assumption that whoever created such a pairing was on crack at the time.

"Shipping charts" are made to help fans keep tabs on complicated shipping dynamics, especially when multiple characters are juggling multiple relationships. "Shipping wars" take place when fans of an unfolding show come to loggerheads about how the relationships between various characters are going to unfold, with both sides defending their preferred outcomes.

---

For the full history of shipping, be sure to check out Know Your Meme's encyclopedia entry for more information.