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- Volume 4, Issue 2, 2019
Queer Studies in Media & Popular Culture - Volume 4, Issue 2, 2019
Volume 4, Issue 2, 2019
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Love is love is love is love: From flaktivism to consumer activism in LGBTQ+ communities
By Amy M. CoreyThis article explores the complex intersections of visibility, identity and consumer activism in LGBTQ+ communities. While the purchase of consumer goods may serve important functions for identity construction and increasing awareness, it also raises concerns about commodification and the effectiveness of consumer activism. Beginning with a description of support for LGBTQ+ communities following the massacre at the Pulse nightclub, the discussion moves to a brief history of different modes of consumer activism. Next, Herman and Chomsky’s Propaganda Model (PM) is presented, adapted and then applied to LGBTQ+ consumer activist commodities with a focus on the role of flak. Distinct from other forms of consumer activism, flaktivism refers to the merging of flak with activism. Key issues surrounding identity formation and raising awareness are integrated into questions of LGBTQ+ visibility and the importance of symbolic values generated through consumption practices. The article concludes with a critique of the limitations of flaktivism and calls for the advancement of LGBTQ+ civil and human rights.
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Going online to be a lesbian: AfterEllen, Vice Versa, The Ladder and queer (?) theorizing in discursive spaces
By Josie RushBy constructing a lineage of mediated discourse in which queer women theorize their spaces and identities, this article argues for the significant place of communication technologies as venues for queer women’s theoretical discussions. Specifically, it analyses content from AfterEllen, a website devoted to popular culture and media for lesbian and bisexual women, connecting the site to two twentieth-century lesbian periodicals, Vice Versa and The Ladder, ultimately arguing for a conception of the discourse produced in these spaces as a type of proto-queer theory. In each space, queer women reject the fictive wholeness proffered by systems of heteronormativity through their critiques of mainstream society and cultivation of representation and community. However, this article also analyses the dangers of theory, as spaces like AfterEllen theorize a lesbian subjectivity that denigrates and dismisses trans lesbians. Utilizing convergence theory, this article additionally argues that heralding the web as the first liberating space of its kind for LGBT individuals obfuscates a rich history of investment in and dependence on communication networks for identity and community formation.
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Assimilation gaming: The reification of compulsory gender roles in RuPaul’s Drag Race
More LessThis article analyses the ‘Bunk Buddies’ mini-challenge on Season 8 of RuPaul’s Drag Race (2009–present, USA: World of Wonder), during which the competitors identified the sexual positions of Andrew Christian models. In this episode (‘Shady Politics’ 2016), gaming and camera technologies work in tandem to repackage heteronormative models of gender and sexual identity for gay audiences. While the mini-challenge offers Andrew Christian models for visual pleasure of gay audiences, the game mechanics and camera angles reify masculine/feminine gender binaries in the way the preferred sexual positions between men are constructed, coding ‘tops’ as masculine and ‘bottoms’ as feminine. While stereotypes in the gay community also present similar understandings of compulsory gender roles, this depiction in RuPaul’s Drag Race, a groundbreaking television series celebrating gay lives and gender subversion through drag, is particularly troubling because it mythologizes a binary gender model that cites the heterosexual matrix and assimilates gay men into traditional male and female gender roles according to their preferred sexual positions. The ‘Bunk Buddies’ challenge thus suggests that sexual positions between men also have a literacy based on masculinity (penetrating) and femininity (receiving).
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The evolution of LGBT research in Israel
By Amit KamaThis meta-analysis constitutes an attempt at mapping LGBT research in Israel with respect to its evolution and distribution of various attributes. Due to the relatively small size of Israel, it is possible to aggregate the entire catalogue of academic studies carried out within this field. The corpus includes all scholarly works (n=586) published about LGBT people and/or related issues in Israel between 1942 and 2018. Several aspects were critically examined: historical trajectories and distributions of languages, disciplines, topics, genres, researched populations and authors. This meta-analysis sheds light on how changes in the social sphere paved the way for the sudden growth in this field and how other macro-level phenomena affected various aspects of the field. The evolution of LGBT studies in Israel is characterized, inter alia, by a spiral movement that was driven by a nucleus of pioneering scholars who have been paving the way for others.
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Classic Media Review Essay
More LessAfter Sex, Eric Amadio (2007) USA: NALA Films and Supino Pictures
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Book Reviews
Authors: Aaron Raphael Ponce, Jaime García-Iglesias, Elisa Padilla and Kirwan McHarryAnti-Gender Campaigns in Europe: Mobilizing against Equality, Roman Kuhar and David Paternotte (eds) (2017) London: Rowman and Littlefield International, 302 pp., ISBN 978-1-78348-999-2, h/bk, $132.00; ISBN 978-1-78660-000-4, p/bk, $41.95
Many Splendored Things: Thinking Sex and Play, Susanna Paasonen (2018) London: Goldsmiths Press, 208 pp., ISBN 978-1-90689-782-6, h/bk, $30.00
RuPaul’s Drag Race and the Shifting Visibility of Drag Culture, Niall Brennan and David Gudelunas (eds) (2017) Cham: Springer Nature and Palgrave Macmillan, 309 pp., ISBN 978-3-31950-617-3, h/bk, $109.00; ISBN 978-3-31984-444-2, p/bk, $34.99
Struggling for Ordinary: Media and Transgender Belonging in Everyday Life, Andre Cavalcante (2018) New York: New York University Press, 221 pp., ISBN 978-1-47988-130-7, h/bk, $89.00; ISBN 978-1-47984-131-8, p/bk, $27.00
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Film Review
More LessThe Favourite, Yorgos Lanthimos (2018) Ireland, UK and USA: Foxlight Searchlight Pictures
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