Women, Feminism, and Pop Politics

by Karrin Vasby Anderson

Women, Feminism, and Pop From "Bitch" to "Badass" and Beyond examines the negotiation of feminist politics and gendered political leadership in twenty-first century U.S. popular culture. In a wide-ranging survey of texts―which includes memes and digital discourses, embodied feminist performances, parody and infotainment, and televisual comedy and drama―contributing authors assess the ways in which popular culture discourses both reveal and reshape citizens’ understanding of feminist politics and female political figures. Two archetypes of female identity figure prominently in its analysis. "Bitch" is a frame that reflects the twentieth-century anxiety about powerful women as threatening and unfeminine, trapping political women within the double bind between femininity and competence. "Badass" recognizes women’s capacity to lead but does so in a way that deflects attention away from the persistence of sexist stereotyping and cultural misogyny. Additionally, as depictions of political women become increasingly complex and varied, fictional characters and actual women are beginning to move beyond the bitch and badass frames, fashioning collaborative and comic modes of leadership suited to the new global milieu. This book will be of interest to students and scholars interested in communication, U.S. political culture, gender and leadership, and women in media.

370 pages, Paperback

Published May 31, 2018

About the author

Karrin Vasby Anderson, Ph.D. is Associate Professor of Communication Studies at Colorado State University http://communicationstudies.colostate..., where she serves as a Women’s Studies affiliate faculty member http://www.wps.colostate.edu/, and a board member for the CSU Center for Public Deliberation http://www.cpd.colostate.edu/. She is a recipient of the Feminist Scholarship Award from the Organization for Research on Women and Communication http://www.orwac.org/Home.html and a co-recipient of the Carrie Chapman Catt Prize for Research on Women in Politics http://www.las.iastate.edu/CattCenter....