WGS-311 Engendering Entertainment: Feminism and Popular Culture
Investigates the complex intersections between feminism and popular culture through several different lenses: by exploring how feminists make arguments about popular culture; by looking at the complexities of public femininity in today's popular culture, including figures such as Lady Gaga and Katy Perry and television shows like The Bachelor and Grey's Anatomy; by focusing on a variety of articulations of feminism within mass media, blogs, social media, and popular books such as Ariel Levy's Female Chauvinist Pigs, and Caitlin Moran's How to Be a Woman. Along the way we will ask questions about: what makes a work of art feminist; how modern media contributes to or distracts us from a variety of political debates in the realm of female equality and how can we, as individuals, use modern media to create and advance smart, feminist arguments.