I see a lot of people on this site and in fanfiction in general talk about how a character is acting 'Slytherin"

By this they usually mean that the character was sneaky or tricky.

Is this really a requirement for being in the Slytherin House? From canon it appears that the defining trait of a Slytherin is ambition rather than craftiness.

We really only have to look at Crabbe and Goyle to see that guile and even rudimentary amounts of intelligence aren't really a requirement to enter Slytherin house.


So, do you guys think that the idea that members of Slytherin house are supposed to be exceptionally cunning is a totally fanon concept? Am I missing something important from the books?

 

In the first book, the Sorting Hat sings about the traits that each of the Founders wanted in their house members. SS wanted his members to be cunning and ambitious.

Crabbe and Goyle may be dumb, but they did help Malfoy fool Dumbledore. Albus may have known about the plot to kill him, but he was totally fucking oblivious about the plan to sneak Death Eaters into Hogwarts. That shows at least a little bit of sneakiness and deception.

EDIT: Just found the lyrics to the Sorting Song from PS:

Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make you're real friends
Those cunning folk will use any means
To achieve their ends

 

Damn it my comp restarting while I was writing, I'll try to summarize.

I think it is ambition that is prized above all in Slytherin, rather than cunning and guile. Family also plays a heavy part in choosing what house you belong. I also think people tend to look to much into the politics of the Slytherin House. People tend to forget that they are just kids, and while ambitious I don't think there is a hierarchy in the house.

 

As people aren't as simple as being able to be sorted into four compartments, well, I'd take what the hat sings with a grain of salt.

 

It's not like Percy was particularly brave, or Cedric particularly loyal, or any Ravenclaw particularly studious. Just another thing JK didn't think through. The Houses exist to sort good from evil, as well as important from red-shirts (Trek reference).

Harry, Dean, Hermione, and Ravenclaw Terry go to a Death Eaters hideout, guess whose not coming back alive?

 

I agree completely. I just can't take stories where a bunch of eleven year olds are setting up this complex alliance system seriously.

 

Slytherin students are more ambitious than cunning. "Cunning" may be a secondary trait that the Sorting Hat looks at when deciding which house to sort you in.

 

Maybe the hat knows you're not particulary cunning, or very brave, but the hat may now what house will help you most in life.

 

I hate it when Gryffindors desrcibed as rash and stupid in fanon. Look at Dumbledore, McGonagall, Percy, Hermione, etc..And Voldemort's goal is not to kill all Gryffindors.

 

But the canon makes it perfectly clear that the aspect which makes the final decision above all others is personal choice. So unless one has never heard of houses and its qualities or doesn't care or is undecided, the hat just places one where he wants to.

So it comes down to choices one makes in life. What you want to be? Once they get into that house, their mindset alters to that of his house-mates. Like a first year Ravenclaw seeing everyone studying and he too does that in order to belong. Seven years like that and his character is entirely changed to that of a studious one.

 

I think that perhaps she tried to clean that notion up a little in DH, where, in Snape's memories Dumbledore makes a mention of how they "sort too early" as Snape is as courageous as any Gryffindor. Or something to that effect, can't really remember

 

I personally feel that a house should not be used as an adjective to describe a person. I prefer stories using the words sly, cunning, ambigious instead of a vague Slytherin.

 

I don't think it's based entirely on personality. If you remember Harry chose. And no one in the books ever mention what the hat said to him bar Harry, perhaps, even subconsciously, people ask the hat to place them into a specific house.

And I do think that the houses call for some stereotypes. Hufflepuffs in general seem fairly loyal. You don't see too many Ravenclaws, but Cho was and Luna seemed to be. Gryffindors again as a generalisation are brave. The Slytherins seem fairly cunning and Draco especially is ambitious. But, just because the people in these houses have the attributes doesn't mean they don't share ones from other houses. Percy - Ambitious. Snape - Brave in a twisted sense. Hermione - Intelligent. Slughorn - Loyal.

 

I don't mind if an author, maybe once or twice in a story, writes someone saying the phrase, 'How Slytherin of you.' or something similar. God, though, some people drive that phrase into the fucking ground.

I can't recall which story it was but there was this one where every time Harry spoke to a different character they would say, 'How Slytherin of you.' and he would respond with, 'The Sorting Hat wanted to put me in Slytherin.'

By the seventh or eighth time this exchange was used in the story, I wanted to sort the author into a hospital.

Actually, that's what house Harry should be sorted into. We have all these fics where the Hat either refuses to sort Harry or sorts him into All the houses or sorts him into the uber ancient and secret Merlin house or Dragon house, et cetera...
He needs to be sorted into the Hospital Wing instead of the other four houses because that's where he spends most of his time. Poppy can be his head of house. She's seen him naked often enough, they should get along fine.

Harry gets sorted into the Hospital Wing. I called it, remember this date.

 

I always had the impression that most employers don't really care what house you were in. It's like an employer or friends at college not caring what high school you went too. I just can't see I decision made at the age of eleven can determine the rest of ones life.

 

This is what it means to be a true slytherin........