Televising popular feminism

Bibliographic Data

ID12780433
AuthorsSarah Kornfield (0000-0002-3185-9163, Michigan United, corresponding author), Elizabeth Bassett (0000-0002-4817-8030, Hope College)
Year2022
Volume21
Issue1
Pages15-28
Publication date2022-05-03
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenuePopular Communication (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1540-5702 • E-ISSN: 1540-5710
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/15405702.2022.2071900
OpenAlexW4225421531
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited27

Recently, televisual programs such as TV Land’s Younger (2015), Freeform’s The Bold Type (2017), The CW’s Charmed reboot (2018), and Netflix’s Sex Education (2019) joined consumer culture’s era of popular feminism by hailing audiences through feminist appeals. Pilot episodes sell series to network executives and viewers – establishing series’ central tensions. Thus, we analyze how feminism operates in these series’ pilots, attending to their narrative premises and televisual styles. Situating this analysis within the frameworks of postfeminism, girl power, and popular feminism, we trace an overlapping continuum of feminist iterations, from individualized feminism on Younger to corporate feminism on The Bold Type and then collective feminism on Charmed’s reboot and an everyday feminism on Sex Education. Analyzing this television cycle, we argue that while imperfect, these pilots’ iterations of popular feminism represent a transformation from postfeminist entertainment toward politically engaged feminism

Art · Feminism · Literature · Media studies · Narrative · Popular culture · Reboot · Sociology · Computer Science · Gender Studies · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Media Studies and Communication · Sexuality, Behavior, and Technology

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