Feminism rebranded : women?s magazines online and ?the return of the F-word?

In recent years feminism has gained spectacular levels of visibility, notably among young women and in the media, especially online. This article makes a novel contribution to a growing discussion about ?the new cultural life of feminism? (Diffractions, 2016), and in particular the ?mediated feminist landscape? (Banet-Weiser, 2015) and its ?new luminosity in popular culture? (Gill, 2016) by bringing to the conversation the voices of those very individuals doing the mediating, providing such luminosity. Drawing on 68 in-depth interviews with the producers of women?s online magazines from the UK and from Spain, we examine the range of ways in which these professionals define and dis/identify with feminism, as well as explain, applaud or critique the emergence of a ?new feminism? promoted by their publications. In general terms, the analysis shows that the talk of women?s magazine producers constitutes a heterogeneous discursive terrain filled with ambivalence and ideological dilemmas. Additionally we show how the recent interest in feminism by these media is deeply but not only ideological, necessarily but not simply commercially-driven, and involved in simultaneous practices of de-stigmatising as well as depoliticising the movement. We suggest that in its transition into popular media feminism is ?rebranded? in such a way that both opens up and closes down possibilities, in a contradictory dynamic of regulation and adaptation that is characteristic of ?cool capitalism? (McGuigan, 2009).

Transnational technologies of gender and mediated intimacy

Against widespread prognostications, the Internet has not entailed the demise of commercial women's magazines. Yet print publications are being supplanted by online versions, which are proliferating. These websites offer similar content free of charge and significantly greater opportunities for interaction. This thesis is a feminist qualitative study of contemporary online magazines targeting young women, based in the UK and in Spain. Focusing on twelve publications- six from each country- the research inquires into the different but interrelated dimensions of text, user and production. In particular, it asks questions about changes and challenges brought about by the online environment. Of especial interest are representations of gender, sex, sexuality and intimate relationships. In the context of a resurgence of interest in feminist ideas and engagement, the thesis also examines the ways in which women's magazines relate to- and reconfigure- feminism. The research adopts a multi-methods approach, and draws on a large body of different data. Comprising the primary data are: a) 270 editorial articles; b) 2.657 peer-to-peer messages posted on the sites' discussion forms; and c) 68 interviews with producers, primarily editors and writers. Additionally informing the study is an assortment of supplementary material, including: magazine public communications, archived print copies, trade press, news reports on the sector, and field notes from events organised by interested parties. Influenced by a social constructionist perspective, the analysis uses thematic, discourse and conjunctural approaches, thereby making connections between the details of text and talk, wider cultural sensibilities, and the socio-historical context at large. It deploys postfeminism as a critical analytical term to capture gendered features of contemporary cultural life, and engages with feminist work aiming to understand the operation of power under neoliberalism. A number of new concepts are advanced to make sense of the identified landscape of patrioarcho-neoliberal power, including 'postfeminist biologism' and 'confidence chic', and to capture shifts taking place in the industry, such as an all-encompassing 'authenticity turn', together with the interpellation of a new subject online: the 'shareaholic'. The research contributes empirical insights and critical theorisations concerning the contemporary young woman's (online) magazine, and digital journalism and Internet cultures more generally. Furthermore, this thesis offers understandings about cultural discourses and contestations around sex, gender and sexuality, and about the relationship between femininity, feminism, commercial and popular media cultures: capturing both Spain/UK national specifities and transnational patterns

‘Porn Trouble’: On the Sexual Regime and Travels of Postfeminist Biologism

In this article, I explore the emergent relationship between feminist media studies/cultural studies and the field of Evolutionary Psychology (EP). EP scholars increasingly conduct research on media and popular culture. At the same time, media/ted texts are increasingly marked by EP discourses. I take as my focus commercial women's online magazines produced in the UK and in Spain and accessed globally. Specifically, I explore a recurrent thread in their discussion forums: women expressing confusion, concern, disappointment, hurt and/or self-doubt, and asking for advice on discovering that their male partners consume various pornographies. A feminist poststructuralist discursive analysis is developed to explore both peer-to-peer and editorial advice on such ‘porn trouble’. I show how pseudo-scientific discourses give support to a narrative of male immutability and female adaptation in heterosexual relationships, and examine how these constructions are informed by EP accounts of sexual difference. The article offers empirical insights into the penetration of EP logics and narratives into popular culture transnationally. Advancing the notion of ‘postfeminist biologism’, my analysis contributes to feminist interrogations of EP's ongoing popularity in the face of sound, longstanding and widespread criticism of it as scientifically flawed and culturally pernicious

From Produsers to Shareaholics: Changing Models of Reader Interaction in Women’s Online Magazines

Women’s online magazines have been constantly proliferating and increasingly supplanting print publications. Contributing to their success, these sites offer similar content free of change and significantly greater opportunities for interaction – often in the form of discussion forums. However, these interactive spaces are currently disappearing, being replaced by an ever-escalating emphasis upon social network sites (SNSs). This article critically examines this changing model of reader interaction in women’s online magazines, drawing on a study of 68 interviews with industry insiders, forum user-generated content, and a variety of trade material. The analysis demonstrates how the decision to close the forums and embrace SNSs responds to multiple determinants, including a corporate doctrine of control over users’ discourse and outsourcing new modalities of free consumer labour, constituting a new ideal worker-commodity online: “the shareaholic”. This exercise of power has varying levels of success, and potentialities remain for users to exercise some transformative subversion, for example through what the article theorises as “labour of disruption”. Nonetheless, the emergent SNS-based magazine model of reader interaction poses a serious challenge to ongoing celebrations both in the industry and in some scholarly work about an increasingly democratic and user-led digital media ecosystem

Gender wars and cancel culture in academia: Umut Özkırımlı in conversation with Laura Favaro

The Oxford English Dictionary defines cancel culture as «the action or practice of publicly boycotting, ostracizing, or withdrawing support from a person, institution, etc., thought to be promoting culturally unacceptable ideas». Though accurate, this definition is incomplete since cancel culture goes way beyond boycotting or ostracizing. It includes a wide spectrum of sanctions, spanning from public naming and shaming, censorship and job loss to intimidation and outright attacks in the form of verbal and physical abuse. This article discusses the mechanisms and negative impacts of cancel culture in academia by focusing on the case of Laura Favaro, who was ‘cancelled’ after publishing an article on the findings of her research on academia’s ‘gender wars’. The concerted attempts to silence certain — particularly feminist — perspectives on sex and gender have severe and wide-ranging implications for researchers and the scholarly endeavour as a whole, contributing to the toxic atmosphere created by the neoliberalisation of universities

¿Pornografía feminista, pornografía antirracista y pornografía antiglobalización? Para una crítica del proceso de pornificación cultural (Feminist pornography, anti-racist pornography and anti-globalization pornography? For a critique of the process of cultural pornification)

Resumen En la (re)producción de lo que se ha denominado “pornificación” van de la mano el mercado, la cultura popular y secciones del ámbito académico, incluso una parte del feminismo. Este artículo plantea una (re)visión crítica de este fenómeno, así como de la alianza entre sexualización-transgresión-mercado-universidad. Primero se traza la genealogía de esta situación, partiendo de la “revolución sexual” de los años sesenta y su deriva capitalista y patriarcal, se sigue con las “guerras del sexo” de los ochenta, y finalmente se llega a la cultura pornificada del nuevo milenio y el auge de los porn studies. En una segunda parte, el artículo propone una aproximación al proceso (y éxito) de la pornificación cultural en relación al neoliberalismo, entendido como una forma de gubermentabilidad profundamente generizada. Se introducen una serie de conceptos críticos que consideramos útiles para futuros análisis feministas de este complejo panorama, entre los que destacan: “feminismo desarticulado”, “emprendedora sexual” y “postfeminismo biologista”. En la conclusión dejamos planteados algunos interrogantes críticos sobre la posibilidad y deseabilidad de una pornografía feminista. Abstract Working together to (re)produce what has been called “pornification” are the market, popular culture and sectors within the academic sphere, even some forms of feminism. This article sets out a critical (re)vision of this phenomenon, together with the alliance between sexualisation-transgression-market-university. First it traces the genealogy of this situation, starting from the “sexual revolution” of the sixties and its capitalist and patriarchal re-channeling, continuing with the “sex wars” of the eighties, and finally arriving at the pornified culture of the new millennium and the rise of porn studies. In a second part, the article proposes approaching the process (and success) of cultural pornification in relation to neoliberalism, understood as a mode of governmentality that is profoundly gendered. It introduces a series of critical concepts we consider useful for future feminist analyses of this complex landscape, notable among which are: “feminism disarticulated”, “sexual entrepreneur” and “postfeminist biologism”. In the conclusion we pose some critical questions about the possibility and desirability of feminist pornography

Postfeminism as a critical tool for gender and language study

This article introduces the concept of postfeminism and highlights its value for research in language and gender studies. After discussing theoretical, historical and backlash perspectives, we advance an understanding of postfeminism as a sensibility - a patterned-yet-contradictory phenomenon intimately connected to neoliberalism. We consider elements widely theorised as constituting the postfeminist sensibility, alongside concerns shared by those who take postfeminism as their object of critical inquiry, in addition to an analytic category for cultural critique. The article then illustrates how the postfeminist sensibility may operate empirically, in the context of the doing and undoing of gender equality policies in workplaces. The article responds to calls for the field of language and gender to reinvigorate its political impetus, and to engage with feminist scholarship on postfeminism, particularly as recently developed in media and cultural studies