Names

     Autology: the study of oneself

A cursory glance through different words, terms, and phrases relating to self-ship, and discussion about the vocabulary I use. This is just my personal thoughts and feelings!

General 'terminology'

Boys/'my boys' - This is probably my MOST used word... ever. Just in general. A huge majority of the characters I like are male so I kind of just call all of them My Boys. When my friend and I settle down to talk about our indulgences, we literally use it as a verb - 'are we boying tonight? i can't wait to boy', etc. It's so ingrained in me now that if I had to stop saying it I might explode. Boy is an adjective, a noun, a verb, a way of life to me.

F/O; fictional other - I very rarely use the term F/O. When I do use it, it's mostly because I need a shorthand to refer to the general concept of loving a character, or I'm using it because I think other people that do use the term will see what I'm saying and I want it to be easily accessible to them. I don't actually refer to any of the characters I love as 'my F/Os' when it's just me thinking to myself. I have always found it a little silly sounding, probably because 'significant other' also sounds stilted and a little odd to me. I think the slash in it also reminds me a little too much of Y/N, which I find very silly as well.

OC -

Self-insert - This is the most natural way for me to refer to this whole process/concept. It must be the term I heard first or something. I knew someone on Tumblr years ago who would condense it to 'sinsert' and that still makes me giggle when I think about it now. I use the term 'self-insert' to refer both to the concept of dating fictional characters, and also the avatar/character I use to represent myself, though lately I've been using 'S/I' more when referring to my representational character.

S/I - Short for 'self-insert', but used more often to refer to the character representing me instead of the overall concept. I don't know why the slash doesn't bother me here, but it does in F/O...?

Self-ship - I use self-ship less often than self-insert. I don't actually like it that much to be honest, now that I think about it? I think I must have seen a few people use it, and it kind of crept into my vocabulary. I still prefer self-insert for the most part.

Sona -

X reader -

Yume; yumejoshi; yumeship; etc. -

Y/N -

Self-referential

Names -