Andi Schwartz
Biographic Data
| ID | 3920780 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Andi Schwartz |
| GIVEN NAMES | Andi |
| FAMILY NAME | Schwartz |
| SIGNATURE | SCHWARTZ A |
| AFFILIATIONS | York University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6433-7409 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 9 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 15 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 9 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2018 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Fast femme-inism and the femme phallus
Engaging with the intellectual legacy of Shannon Bell presents an opportunity to re-insert sexuality into femme scholarship and make explicit femme’s contribution to sexuality studies. In this article, we offer a femme analysis of Bell’s work and use femme scholarship to extend and rework two of her key concepts: the female phallus and fast feminism. We bring femme scholarship into dialogue with Bell to offer a ‘fast femme-inist’ theory of femme …
“Any cosmo girl would’ve known”
In 2001, the film Legally Blonde was released into a pop cultural landscape saturated with the Spice Girls’ brand of feminism-lite and postfeminist media texts like Sex and the City (1998–2004). With its firm hold on “girlie” feminism, Legally Blonde is postfeminist — but not post-femme. I extend the claim that femme theory can be located in low-cultural spaces and texts to understand the “chick flick” as another possible site of femme theory. I …
Opening up the pit
What does it mean to be punk within the Canadian music industry? This article offers a close reading of the band PUP’s politics, grassroots partnerships and personal interviews to argue that they not only skew punk in genre terms, but also embody a punk ethos. Furthermore, this article will confront the ambivalent politics of punk as it becomes entangled with cultural nationalism and national identity-building through institutional arts funding a…
Femme Life on the Screen
In this presentation, I will share key findings from my dissertation research on femme internet culture. Following the conference theme, this presentation will focus on the use of online methods for documenting subcultural life, and online subculture’s ability to make life more liveable for marginalized subjects. In this project, I define “femme” as a queer identity that is marked by a critical and political engagement with femininity that manife…
Radical vulnerability
In Western philosophy, vulnerability and femininity have been positioned as subordinate and weak. Reparative readings of selfies can offer a way to reclaim both vulnerability and femininity as generative, connective, and political. In this paper, I examine femme selfies collected during an online ethnography of femme Internet culture on Instagram. I draw from critical feminist scholarship on vulnerability and reparative readings of selfies to arg…
Low Femme, low theory
Are memes theory? Memes and femmes are both marked by failure; femmes fail to be sufficiently feminine, or sufficiently queer, memes fail as cultural productions, plagued by low-culture. Together, I argue, femmes and memes produce low theory. In my study of femme memes, I argue that they can be understood as making significant political and cultural contributions if framed by existing scholarship on memes that emphasize political and communicativ…
Soft Femme Theory
Twenty years ago, the figure of the femme appeared on a book cover wielding a knife; more recently, the femme has appeared on Instagram crying in a Polly Pocket skirt. Online, femme is increasingly called 'tender,' 'radically vulnerable,' and 'soft.' In this article, I examine soft femme digital culture on Instagram, and argue that the discourse of 'softness' is used to articulate belonging and to resist neoliberal, masculinist logics. Through an…
“Put on All Your Make-Up and Cry It Off in Public
Locating Femme Theory Online
Paying close attention to the Internet has revelatory potential for femme theory. Femme, a queerly feminine sexual and gender identity, has so far been under theorized and is often treated as unimportant or even suspect in queer and feminist studies (Martin, 1996; Harris and Crocker, 1997; Maltry and Tucker, 2002; Dahl, 2017). Work on femme has proliferated in response to this (mis)treatment of femme (Volcano and Dahl, 2008; Rose and Camilleri, 2…
Radical vulnerability
In Western philosophy, vulnerability and femininity have been positioned as subordinate and weak. Reparative readings of selfies can offer a way to reclaim both vulnerability and femininity as generative, connective, and political. In this paper, I examine femme selfies collected during an online ethnography of femme Internet culture on Instagram. I draw from critical feminist scholarship on vulnerability and reparative readings of selfies to arg…
Soft Femme Theory
Twenty years ago, the figure of the femme appeared on a book cover wielding a knife; more recently, the femme has appeared on Instagram crying in a Polly Pocket skirt. Online, femme is increasingly called 'tender,' 'radically vulnerable,' and 'soft.' In this article, I examine soft femme digital culture on Instagram, and argue that the discourse of 'softness' is used to articulate belonging and to resist neoliberal, masculinist logics. Through an…
Low Femme, low theory
Are memes theory? Memes and femmes are both marked by failure; femmes fail to be sufficiently feminine, or sufficiently queer, memes fail as cultural productions, plagued by low-culture. Together, I argue, femmes and memes produce low theory. In my study of femme memes, I argue that they can be understood as making significant political and cultural contributions if framed by existing scholarship on memes that emphasize political and communicativ…
“Put on All Your Make-Up and Cry It Off in Public
Locating Femme Theory Online
Paying close attention to the Internet has revelatory potential for femme theory. Femme, a queerly feminine sexual and gender identity, has so far been under theorized and is often treated as unimportant or even suspect in queer and feminist studies (Martin, 1996; Harris and Crocker, 1997; Maltry and Tucker, 2002; Dahl, 2017). Work on femme has proliferated in response to this (mis)treatment of femme (Volcano and Dahl, 2008; Rose and Camilleri, 2…
Femme Life on the Screen
In this presentation, I will share key findings from my dissertation research on femme internet culture. Following the conference theme, this presentation will focus on the use of online methods for documenting subcultural life, and online subculture’s ability to make life more liveable for marginalized subjects. In this project, I define “femme” as a queer identity that is marked by a critical and political engagement with femininity that manife…
Radical vulnerability
In Western philosophy, vulnerability and femininity have been positioned as subordinate and weak. Reparative readings of selfies can offer a way to reclaim both vulnerability and femininity as generative, connective, and political. In this paper, I examine femme selfies collected during an online ethnography of femme Internet culture on Instagram. I draw from critical feminist scholarship on vulnerability and reparative readings of selfies to arg…
Low Femme, low theory
Are memes theory? Memes and femmes are both marked by failure; femmes fail to be sufficiently feminine, or sufficiently queer, memes fail as cultural productions, plagued by low-culture. Together, I argue, femmes and memes produce low theory. In my study of femme memes, I argue that they can be understood as making significant political and cultural contributions if framed by existing scholarship on memes that emphasize political and communicativ…
Soft Femme Theory
Twenty years ago, the figure of the femme appeared on a book cover wielding a knife; more recently, the femme has appeared on Instagram crying in a Polly Pocket skirt. Online, femme is increasingly called 'tender,' 'radically vulnerable,' and 'soft.' In this article, I examine soft femme digital culture on Instagram, and argue that the discourse of 'softness' is used to articulate belonging and to resist neoliberal, masculinist logics. Through an…
Opening up the pit
What does it mean to be punk within the Canadian music industry? This article offers a close reading of the band PUP’s politics, grassroots partnerships and personal interviews to argue that they not only skew punk in genre terms, but also embody a punk ethos. Furthermore, this article will confront the ambivalent politics of punk as it becomes entangled with cultural nationalism and national identity-building through institutional arts funding a…
“Any cosmo girl would’ve known”
In 2001, the film Legally Blonde was released into a pop cultural landscape saturated with the Spice Girls’ brand of feminism-lite and postfeminist media texts like Sex and the City (1998–2004). With its firm hold on “girlie” feminism, Legally Blonde is postfeminist — but not post-femme. I extend the claim that femme theory can be located in low-cultural spaces and texts to understand the “chick flick” as another possible site of femme theory. I …
Fast femme-inism and the femme phallus
Engaging with the intellectual legacy of Shannon Bell presents an opportunity to re-insert sexuality into femme scholarship and make explicit femme’s contribution to sexuality studies. In this article, we offer a femme analysis of Bell’s work and use femme scholarship to extend and rework two of her key concepts: the female phallus and fast feminism. We bring femme scholarship into dialogue with Bell to offer a ‘fast femme-inist’ theory of femme …
Gender Studies (8 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Gender, Feminism, and Media (7 works) · Aesthetics (5 works) · Art (5 works) · Law (5 works) · Politics (5 works) · Femininity (4 works) · Media studies (4 works) · Political science (4 works)