Groomed for capitalism

Biopower and the self-care, self-improvement rituals of adolescence in Bo Burnham'sEighth Gradeand Donald Glover'sAtlanta

Bibliographic Data

ID2984348
AuthorsJennifer Lee O’donnell (0000-0002-6416-0279, Texas State University, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume27
Issue3
Pages307-325
Publication date2021-05-04
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Identities (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1350-4630 • E-ISSN: 1363-0296
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13504630.2020.1816954
OpenAlexW3086483391
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited27

Self-care, self-improvement and biopower, as they relate to the commodification of adolescence and the grooming of young people as neoliberal citizens, are the central concerns of this article. Foregrounding new perspectives on the effects such trends have on the body [Cusset, F. (2018). How the world swung to the right: Fifty years of counterrevolutions. MIT Press], it analyzes two texts, the film Eighth Grade and the Atlanta episode entitled ‘Fubu’ (season 2, episode 10), to consider how neoliberal capitalist values manifest in the lives of protagonists, Kayla and Earn, whose young bodies have been colonized by the self-care, self-improvement ethos of our current cultural spirit

Aesthetics · Art · Atlanta · Biopower · Capitalism · Commodification · Economics · Economy · Ethos · Foregrounding · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Gender Studies · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Gothic Literature and Media Analysis · History · Law · Themes in Literature Analysis

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