6 Degrees of Canada

6 Degrees of Canada, also known as Canadian 6 Degrees or C6D, is a multifandom fandom that grew out of the due South community. Many fans use the term "6 degrees of due South," but the term C6D was most likely coined in 2005 to describe a wider range of fandoms. Originally, ds 6 degrees included fanfic based on other projects that the actors from due South worked on.
Whether or not C6D is a fandom in its own right or a part of the due South fandom has been a subject of some discussion.
Some attempts to define C6D:
# Fandoms that feature someone who was in a production with a due South cast regular.
# Fandoms of actors and directors who were not directly involved with due South, but worked with actors who appeared in Due South.
# "C6D, which includes anything ever done by a Canadian, to a Canadian, with a Canadian, filmed, written, played or sung in Canada, or mentioning the words Canada, Canadian, Canuck, Arctic, Province, Mountie, Hockey, Curling, Maple Syrup, Chicago, or Rubber Ducks."
Since a large percentage of current Canadian actors have worked together at least once, the scope of C6D is rather amorphous and potentially massive.
A tentative included in C6D was posted on the LiveJournal community c6d weekly. According to a poll conducted by akamine chan in March 2008, C6D was generally considered to be based mainly on the projects of seven people: actors Paul Gross, Callum Keith Rennie, Hugh Dillon, David Marciano and writer/directors/actors Don McKellar, Bruce McDonald and Daniel MacIvor. Omphale conducted a poll in June 2008 to further gauge the perception of the limits of the C6D fandoms. For the Due South Canadian 6 Degrees Big Bang challenge, C6D is defined more narrowly as "due South or any other fandom featuring characters played by Paul Gross, David Marciano, or Callum Keith Rennie."
Canadian actors who are NOT considered part of C6D include David Hewlett (who is considered a part of the SGA 6 Degrees fandom).
==History==
Writing crossovers between Due South and other media starring the actors from Due South has been a popular fan activity since the 1990s.
For example, Northern Comfort, a 1999 fic by Kellie Matthews hosted on the Due South Archive, featured Benton Fraser/Billy Tallent (Callum Keith Rennie's character in Hard Core Logo). A 2002 multimedia zine, It's Raining Men #3, included a Due South/DaVinci's Inquest crossover, as well as non-crossover Due South and Hard Core Logo stories.
The show had been off the air since 1999, so as time passed it was natural for Due South fans to look for other media the actors were in.
ds_noticeboard, started in 2004, featured news and fic updates related to Hard Core Logo and Wilby Wonderful from early on, and mod cesperanza clarified the community rules thusly in a January 2005 post:
In a 2007 ds_meta post, brooklinegirl commented on the phenomenon of Canada fandom:
Canada fandom gained momentum on LiveJournal with several communities dedicated to it, including:
*ds_6degrees, created 8 September 2005
*ds_snippets, created 29 January 2007
*c6d_weekly, created 31 March 2008
*c6d_universe, created 11 September 2009
In early 2006 two locked media sharing LJ communities were created, one secret and focused specifically on Due South adjacent content and one less secret and focused on Canadian television generally. The C6D community was international and took a completionist's approach to 6 degrees media viewing at the same time that affordable DVD releases were not available for even some of the better known titles, let alone one-off guest appearances on obscure Canadian TV.
A 2007 post in ds_snippets states that although "[t]here are lots of great due South and 6 degrees comms out there" they wanted a place for short fic.slidellra. , posted 29th-Jan-2007
In August 2007, fans started a weekly movie viewing/chat, called simply "the C6D thing."sisterofdream's LiveJournal post Concerning primarily the viewing parties (Accessed October 2, 2008)also mentioned in ds_noticeboard on 26 August 2007: As of December 2009, the C6D thing was still going on a semimonthly basis.sisterofdream. , posted to ds_noticeboard 4 December 2009. (Accessed 10 January 2021.) During the 2010s Due South Fandom Renaissance tumblr fans also held C6D viewing parties., 18 January 2021. (accessed 8 May 2021)
== Source Fandoms ==
C6D source fandoms that already have a following are considered part of C6D, but the focus is mainly on the artists that are central to the C6D fandom. For instance, Battlestar Galactica is considered to be a C6D fandom, but fanworks tend towards the Leoben-centric (Callum Keith Rennie's character).
===Television===
Battlestar Galactica (2003)	Bliss
Blood Ties 	Californication
Chasing Rainbows 	Civil Wars
Da Vinci's Inquest 	due South
Durham County 	Flashpoint
Higher Ground 	Kingdom Hospital
La Femme Nikita 	Murder On Her Mind
My Life As A Dog 	Quality Of Life
ReGenesis 	Rent-A-Goalie
Shattered 	Slings and Arrows
Smallville 	Supernatural
Tales Of The City 	The Red Green Show
The Shield 	Tin Man
Twitch City 	Whiskey Echo
===Film===
Aspen Extreme 	Buried On Sunday
Blade: Trinity 	Blindness
Claire's Hat 	Cold Comfort
Curtis's Charm 	Dance Me Outside
Double Happiness 	eXistenZ
Falling Angels 	Flower & Garnet
For Those Who Hunt The Wounded Down	Frank's Cock
Getting Married In Buffalo Jump 	Gunless
H20 	Hard Core Logo
Hard Core Logo 2 	Last Night
Lucid 	Masterminds
Men With Brooms 	Men With Guns
Memento 	Murder Most Likely
Murder Scene/Seen 	Normal
Passchendaele 	Paris Or Somewhere
Picture Claire 	Pontypool
Purple Toast 	Slap Shot 2
The Invisible 	The Love Crimes of Gillian Guess
The Tracey Fragments 	The Trojan Horse
Torso 	Trailer Park Boys: The Movie
Trigger 	Unnatural And Accidental
Whale Music 	Whole New Thing
Wilby Wonderful 	X-Files 2
XXX's and OOO's 	
===Other Media===
* Two Houses (album by Paul Gross and David Keeley)(1999)
* Give The Dog A Bone (album by Paul Gross and David Keeley)(limited edition)(2001)
* Love And Carnage (album by Paul Gross and David Keeley)(commercial edition of Give The Dog A Bone)
* Headstones (Hugh Dillon's band)
== Journal Communities ==
* c6d weekly
* ds_snippets
* c6d_music (deleted)
* ds_6degrees
* c6d_universe
* Due South Canadian 6 Degrees Big Bang
* c6d - Dreamwidth community for posting fanworks
* alternate_ds_c6d - dreamwidth AU challenge community
== Conventions ==
The Muskrat Jamboree slash convention has a strong C6D focus, not only in its panels but in organized con games like "Canadian Pictionary" and in its Canadian-themed goody bags. The concom's explanation for the Muskrat itself? "It's a Canadian thing." 
== Fanwork Examples ==
* Canadian Actor Bingo (vid)
== Fannish Resources ==
* Cap it! Before I die of waitin'!. Stormymouse's Callum Keith Rennie/Paul Gross screencap archive.
* Wilby Wonderful Fanfiction Links by pearl-o (no longer updated) and the more up-to-date Wilbylinks on Delicious
* Slings And Arrows links on Delicious
* Touch My Stump - The HCL Archive
* LiveJournal C6D communities
* Paul Gross & David Keeley @ last.fm
* Canadian Actor RPF (C6D) tag at AO3
* Canadian 6 Degrees and C6D fandom tags at AO3 (not filterable because for "tagging on AO3, a fandom is defined as the source media where your characters, relationships or other concepts originate".AO3 News: . Published: 2020-11-11 According to a ds_noticeboard post, Canadian 6 Degrees was canonized in 2012,, posted by sageness to ds_noticeboard, 18 September 2012. but as of 2021 has been de-canonized.)
* Master list of due South fanfiction: crossovers with dS6Degrees fandoms (slash, gen, het) by viciouscats
* PaulGross.org
==Canadian Actor RPF==
A related fandom, also sometimes called C6D or C6D RPS, is for RPF of the actors. This fandom is sometimes just called Canadian Actor RPF/RPS, but this descriptor is ambiguous as there are Canadian actors who have not worked on TV or film projects associated with C6D, such as David Hewlett. akamine_chan wrote a fandom overview in 2010 for crack_van.
RPF is allowed in some of the C6D journal comms, including c6d weekly (with the caveat that "you must send a notice to the moderator"), c6d_universe, and ds_snippets. It is not allowed on ds_6degrees. ckr_actorfic, a locked comm for Callum Keith Rennie RPF, was created in July 2005. rpf_canada, another locked comm for all Canadian actor RPF (not just C6D) was created in 2007, but proved less popular. Both rpf_canada and ckr_actorfic had moderated membership and statements warning away people who disapproved of RPF.
Callum Keith Rennie, Hugh Dillon, and Paul Gross are the most popular characters in the AO3 tag for Canadian Actor RPF (C6D) (only 50 works total in 2021). The larger Canadian Actor RPF tag listed Callum Keith Rennie as the most popular character in early 2021, but by 2022 he had been displaced by Keanu Reeves., AO3 fandom tag. Accessed 5 March 2022. See also 28 January 2021 Wayback Machine capture.
== References ==
Category:6 Degrees of Canada