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Original Articles

Girl Culture, Revenge and Global Capitalism: Cybergirls, Riot Grrls, Spice Girls

Pages 173-193 | Published online: 09 Jun 2010

References

  • Shiach . 1994 . “ 'Feminism and Popular Culture' ” . In Cultural Theory and Popular Culture , Edited by: Storey , J. 331 London : Harvester Wheatsheaf . Morag Shiach's 'Feminism and Popular Culture' provides an overview of the genealogy of cultural studies and its ramifications for feminism, arguing that 'the intersection of feminism and popular culture has never been anything but troubled'.
  • Modleski , Tania . 1982 . Loving with a Vengeance: Mass-produced Fantasies for Women , New York : Methuen . Like most commentators on this issue, Shiach notes a movement from feminist critique of patriarchal ideologies to studies of resistance. As influential examples, both Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex and Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique pointed to popular culture as pivotal media for the communication of oppressive patriarchal ideologies which women consumers of popular culture inevitably identified with in the course of their consumption. Pivotal texts in the redirection of feminist studies of popular culture towards accounting for the pleasures and resistances of women in consuming popular culture include
  • Ang , Ien . 1989 . Watching Dallas: Soap Opera and the Melodramatic Imagination , London : Routledge .
  • 1995 . Shiach or Dominic Strinati, An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture , London : Routledge . For overviews of changes in relations between feminism and popular culture see
  • Golden , Anna . 1997 . The Spice Girls: an Uncensored Account , xiv London : NewBooks Press .
  • Hall , Stuart and Whannel , Paddy . 1994 . “ 'The Young Audience' ” . In Cultural Theory and Popular Culture , Edited by: Storey , J. 35 London : Harvester Wheatsheaf .
  • Garratt , Sheryl . 1990 . “ 'Teenage Dreams' ” . In On Record: Rock, Pop and the Written Word , Edited by: Frith , S. and Goodwin , A. 401 London : Pantheon .
  • Chambers , Lain . 1990 . Urban Rhythms: Pop Music and Popular Culture , Houndmills : Macmillan . For more closely relevant accounts of the relations between conformity, resistance girls as fans of popular music see
  • McRobbie , Angela . 1993 . 'Shut Up and Dance: Youth Culture and Changing Modes of Femininity' . Cultural Studies , 7 ( 3 ) October and the work of Ehrenreich
  • Hess and Jacobs . 1997 . “ 'Beatlemania: a Sexually Defiant Consumer Subculture?' ” . In The Subculture Reader , Edited by: Gelder , K. and Thornton , S. London : Routledge .
  • Garratt . “ 'Teenage Dreams' ” . 402
  • Eckert , Charles . 1991 . “ 'The Carol Lombard in Macy's Window' ” . In Stardom , Edited by: Gledhill , C. London : Routledge .
  • Leavis , F.R. and Thompson , D. 1933 . Culture and Environment , London : Chatto & Windus .
  • Grossberg , Lawrence . 1994 . “ 'The Deconstruction of Youth' ” . In Cultural Theory and Popular Culture , Edited by: Storey , J. London : Harvester Wheatsheaf . Though more consideration of the globalisation of youth is warranted, for suggestions along these lines see
  • Tracey-Skelton . 1998 . Gill Valentine's collection, Cool Places: Geographies of Youth Culture , London : Routledge .
  • Golden . The Spice Girls xii
  • Frith , Simon . 1996 . Per, fining Rites: On the Value of Popular Music , Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press . I am referring here in particular to in which he sets out to reclaim the concept of 'value' for the study of popular music
  • Golden . The Spice Girls xvi
  • Kruse , Holly . 1990 . “ 'In Praise of Kate Bush' ” . In On Record , Edited by: Frith and Goodwin . 54 London : Pantheon .
  • Driscoll , Catherine . 1995 . “ 'Who Needs a Boyfriend?: the Homoerotic Virgin in Adolescent Women's Magazines' ” . In Speaking Positions: Gender and Ethnicity in Australian Cultural Studies , Edited by: English , D. and van Toorn , P. Melbourne : Victoria University of Technology . This section of my argument is drawn from previous work on girls' magazines. See
  • Fuss , Diana . 1992 . 'Fashion and the Homospectatorial Look' . Critical Inquiry , 18 ( 4 ) Summer : 714
  • Butler . The Psychic Life of Power 17
  • Butler . The Psychic Lift of Power 29 – 30 .
  • Fuss . “ 'Fashion and the Homospectatorial Look' ” . 716
  • Sedgwick , Eve Kofosky . 1990 . Epistemology of the Closet , 159 Berkeley : University of California Press .
  • Kile , Crystal and Gilbert , Laurel . 1996 . SurferGrrrls: Look Ethel, an Internet Guide for Us! , Seattle : Seal Press .
  • Haraway , Donna . 1987 . 'A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s' . Australian Feminist Studies , Autumn 'Cyberfeminism' is a term usually attributed to Sadie Plant, as many cybergirl and cyberfeminism sites note. I will confine my discussion of cyberfeminism here to cybergirl sites, trot for more information see
  • Sinclair , Carla . 1996 . Net Chick , Sydney : Allen & Unwin . and geekgirl's Seven Issue Itch! CD-ROM.
  • Goodwin , Andrew . 1994 . “ 'Popular Music and Postmodern Theory' ” . In Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: a Reader , Edited by: Storey , J. 417 Hemel Hempstead : Harvester Wheatsheat . In the liner notes to the CD version of the first two records Tobi Vail writes: 'We have been written about a lot by big magazines who have never talked to us or seen our shows. They write about us authoritatively, as if they understand us better than we understand our own ideas, tactics, and significance.' This is, of course, a presumption no one challenges with reference to the Spice Girls. Bikini Kill feel they are being misunderstood as popular: 'We want to be an underground band … We don't want to be featured in Newsweek magazine.'
  • Bail , Kathy . 1996 . “ 'DIY Feminism' ” . In DIY Feminism , Edited by: Bail , K. 3 Sydney : Allen & Unwin .
  • Grossberg . 1997 . “ 'Cultural Studies, Modern Logics, and Theories of Globalisation' ” . In Back to Reality?: Social Experience and Cultural Studies , Edited by: McRobbie , A. Manchester : Manchester University Press . On globalisation see
  • During , Simon . 1997 . 'Popular culture on a Global Scale: a Challenge for Cultural Studies?' . Critical Inquiry , Summer Both Grossberg and During distinguish between trans-national economics and globalisation as a dominant idea of the global in relation to which markets, among other things, are established
  • Cross . 1996 . “ 'Geekgirl: Why grrrls Need Modems' ” . In DIY Feminism , Edited by: Bail , K. 80 Sydney : Allen & Unwin . The Geekgirl merchandise page is very interesting in this light, as is their current home page which includes the slogan/caption 'Happy to endorse kewl products'
  • Cross . “ 'Why Grrrls Need Modems' ” . 84
  • Flynn , Bernadette . 1994 . 'VNS Matrix and Virginia Barratt' . Continuum: the Australian Journal of Media and Culture , 8 ( 1 ) : 421 Under the aegis of VNS Matrix you can locate various cybergirl identities, artifacts and realms, like Genderfilth world: 'Tired of bleaching the grime of social conditioning? Then join our tribe of anarchogendaterrorists in Gender Filth World. Explode the binary with deviant software bombs! Feel your gender markings dissolve! (Children admitted free.)' The VNS matrix home page is at .Genderfilth world is at
  • Acker , Kathy . 1997 . 'It's a Spicey Life Vibey Thing' . Age , 7 June : C1 (reprinted from the Guardian)
  • Douglas , Susan J. 1997 . 'Girl Power Puts a New Spice into Feminist Debate' . Nation , 25 August-1 September : 29
  • Golden . The Spice Girls 91
  • Morris , Meaghan . 1997 . “ 'A Question of Cultural Studies' ” . In Back to Reality?: Social Experience and Cultural Studies , Edited by: McRobbie , A. 43 Manchester : Manchester University Press .
  • Morris . “ 'A Question of Cultural Studies' ” . 50
  • Bail . “ 'DIY Feminism' ” . 3 Bail's introduction to DIY feminism, which describes it as a 'generational shift [which] stems from young women's inability to find models of personal identity within the broader and seemingly institutionalised feminism established by older women'
  • Foucault , Michel . 1980 . “ 'Power and Strategies' ” . In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972-1977 , Edited by: Gordon , C. London : Pantheon .
  • Butler , Judith . 1997 . The Psychic Life of Power: Theories in Subjection , 6 Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press . In this context I am utilising only the introductory chapter of this text. Although the progression of Butler's project to find a useful intersection between Foucault and Lacan in this text might be relevant here it will have to be done elsewhere
  • Butler . The Psychic Life of Power 15
  • Butler . The Psychic Lift of Power 17
  • Butler . The Psychic Lift of Power 15
  • Butler The Psychic Life of Power, p. 16.

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