GoH

A convention's Guest of Honor (abbreviated "GoH" from Guest of Honor and pronounced “gō”) is the title given to people the convention is specifically honoring. Most cons have both a Pro GoH and a Fan GoH, but "GoH" is also frequently used as a generic term applying to all kinds of guest including both pros and fans.

A person is usually made a GoH to recognize significant and long-lasting contributions to the SF field or the SF community. (Of course, conventions hope that having a famous name at their convention will draw more attendees, also.) Because of this, repeating GoHs is uncommon and generally frowned on.

A common practice is to reserve "GoH" for a pro writer and have other specific GoHships such as Fan GoH, Artist Guest, Filk Guest, etc. If so, this does not normally indicate a difference in ranking. Everyone called a "GoH" of any flavor is equal.

Rather than simply listing all Guests of Honor and GoH or dividing the GoHs into Pro GoH and Fan GoH categories, some conventions are more specific. When a convention has an Author GoH (sometimes called Writer GoH), this usually means that the con has chosen to list specific descriptive titles. An Author GoH is nearly always a pro. Of course, this being fandom, no rule is followed 100%.

Fan GoH

An FGoH is a convention's GoH who is being honored specifically for their contributions to fandom.

This not preclude that person also being a pro, as long as the honor is for their contributions to fandom specifically. Many well-known pros are also fans and have been honored as Fan Guests of Honor. However, the quality of the honoree’s fanac should always be the first criterion.

An old tradition called for a fan goh to be someone from outside the con’s locale, but this is rarely a consideration today.

Special Guests

Special Guests are sometimes Guests of Honor and sometimes not -- this is a convention-dependent thing. (For Worldcons, Special Guest is never a GoH unless specifically designated as such.) A good way to judge if an ambiguously designated person is a real GoH or simply an important person whose presence is being noted is to count the other guests. If there's reasonably full slate of GoHs without the ambiguous cases, they are probably not GoHs.

Other "Guests"

In general, a "guest" at an SF convention is one of a small number of people whose expenses (but never an appearance fee or honorarium) are paid by the con. When the word "guest" is used to describe someone formally, it practically never refers to the general run of program participants. None-the-less, many conventions use the term "guest" loosely, especially in publications, to mean all program participants.

There are also working positions like toastmaster and program participants which are sometimes headlined in publicity and called "guests" of the convention, but they are not Guests of Honor.

Commercial and media conventions do not follow these rules and frequently have either no GoHs or a plethora of them. While many of the practices were adopted from fandom's, they are not longer part of the community and are not further considered here.

Common GoH Designations

just-plain-GoH	Can mean a generic (unspecified type) GoH and is also commonly used to refer to the pro writer GoH. It depends on local custom.
Fan	A GoH being honored for accomplishments in fandom. The person might also be a pro, but the honor reflects only their fannish accomplishments.
Author	Always means pro writer GoH.
Artist	Can be a fan or a pro.
Editor	Sometimes also used for people in publishing who are not, strictly, editors.
Publisher	Usually does not include editors.
Filk	Always someone being honored for accomplishments in filk, but sometimes “Filk Guest” is a GoH position and sometimes a Special Guest.
Music	A broader category than filk. A Music GoH can be a filker or someone from the mundane music scene (hopefully with a ties to the sf community and not just entertainment). A few filk conventions (such as NEFilk and OVFF) have a Listener Guest (also called Honored Listener), a GoH who is a person who appreciates filk, but doesn't compose it or perform it.
Gaming	Usually a game developer.
Science	Someone honored for achievements in science or technology. Often, this is a member of the SF community, but it doesn’t have to be. (However, scientists who are not connected to the community are prone to ask for honoraria.)
Media	Usually used for people from outside the community who work in movies or TV.
Special	A very confusing category. Sometimes it effectively means "Other GoH" or "GoH-but-we-don't-have-a-neat-category" and sometimes it means "Not a GoH per se but someone we wish to honor or note." Sometimes used to advertise the expected presence of a potential draw. It depends strongly on local custom. See Special Guest for more.

Worldcon GoH

The ultimate GoHship is, of course, being GoH at Worldcon -- it's fandom's equivalent of a Nobel Prize. There is a sensible and long-standing rule of thumb that a Worldcon GoH should have at least thirty years activity in the field before being honored. (The thirty year number is arbitrary, but has proven to be about right -- there are always many potential deserving guests with at least that length of activity -- and does an excellent job of discouraging the honoring of one-hit wonders and charismatic flash-in-the-pans.)

A Worldcon GoH is a member of the sf community whose contributions have had a substantial (positive!) impact on the community. A GoH should be one of the people who made us what we are.

The Worldcon Fan GoHship is the ultimate accolade and as such has a much higher standard than FGoH at a regional convention. A Worldcon FGoH should have been active in fandom for at least thirty years and should have made major (positive) contributions in more than one area of fandom. It should never be given for sheer longevity, and not normally for someone who excels in only one thing.

The oldest Worldcon tradition was to have a single GoH. A second, a FGoH, was added in the 50s and the number of GoHs at a typical convention has gradually increased. More than about five (even at a Worldcon) is considered crass, though, sadly, some conventions go much further, greatly diminishing the honor. (As a rule, Guests of Honor are individuals, but sometimes a couple will be honored and occasionally a group (e.g., The Stranger Club at Noreascon Three). Those cases are generally counted as a single guest, albeit one with multiple heads.)

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