Susan Berridge

I Love You, Man: Gendered narratives of friendship in contemporary Hollywood comedies

This article begins with a simple observation: there are very few contemporary Hollywood films in which women are shown becoming friends. This is in contrast to the “bromance,” in which new connections between men are privileged, yet this pattern has gone largely unremarked in the literature. This article has two aims: to sketch this pattern and explore reasons for it through comparing the “girlfriend flick” and “bromance.” To do this, we first discuss those rare occasions when women do become friends on screen, using Jackie Staceys work to understand the difficulties this narrative trajectory poses for Hollywood. This raises questions about the relationship between the homosocial and homosexual which set up our comparison of female and male friendship films and provides the rationale for our focus on the beginnings of friendships as moments where tensions around gendered fascinations are most obvious. The films discussed are Baby Mama, Step Brothers, I Love You, Man, Funny People, Due Date, and Crazy, Stupid, Love. The differences we identify hinge on issues of gendered representability and identification which have long been at the heart of feminist film scholarship.

Introduction: Feminism, Hashtags and Violence Against Women and Girls

As the third and final instalment of our recent editions on feminist hashtags, this issue of Commentary and Criticism explores the relationship between hashtags and feminist activism around violence against women and girls. Drawing on a range of locally-rooted and transnational examples, the following six essays emphasise the potential of feminist hashtags to expose the transnational pervasiveness of gendered violence, creating a space for women and girls to share their own experiences and, through doing so, challenge “commonsense” understandings of this abuse and promote gendered solidarity. At the same time, these scholars are sensitive to the potential dangers of these hashtag campaigns in over-simplifying complex issues, as well as the threats of gendered violence that occur within online spaces themselves, raising important suggestions for how we, as feminist media scholars, can attempt to overcome these limitations.

Personal Problems and Women's Issues

Teen television drama series are centrally concerned with issues of sexuality as teenage characters gradually mature. Their sexual maturation is key in marking their transition from childhood to adulthood and the genre often emphasises significant moments in this development, such as first kisses, dates and/or sexual experiences. Within the genres sexual culture, representations of sexual violence are common, yet have remained widely neglected by both teen and feminist television criticism. This article addresses this neglect by examining the kinds of stories about sexual violence that emerge in this genre. I argue that a fuller understanding of these narratives is offered by situating them in relation to series’ and generic frameworks more broadly, rather than analysing them in isolation. Specifically, I will explore episodic sexual violence narratives in US programmes between 1990 and 2008, outlining developments in these representations over time. The article begins by mapping where these episodes occur within broader series’ structures. This provides the context for a deeper analysis of how sexual violence functions both narratively and ideologically across these programmes.

From the Woman Who ‘Had It All’ to the Tragic, Ageing Spinster: The Shifting Star Persona of Jennifer Aniston

In a montage episode of Friends (NBC, 1994–2004), ‘The One Where They All Turn 30’ (7.14), Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) sits down to a birthday breakfast with her friends and 24-year-old boyfriend, surrounded by colourful balloons. Dressed in a plain white T-shirt and pyjama bottoms, with shoulder-length bobbed hair and wearing a child’s birthday crown, her youthful girlishness is highlighted. Yet, while the episode underlines Rachel’s youth, it simultaneously suggests that she is at an inappropriate life stage in relation to her age. Rachel’s narrative in the episode revolves around her anxieties about getting older without having achieved any of her self-imposed life goals — goals that include meeting a man, getting married and having children. Reinforcing the idea of Rachel as in a state of arrested development, she is currently living in Joey (Matt LeBlanc) and Chandler’s (Matthew Perry) former apartment, a space that connotes immaturity in the series more widely — connected as it is with bachelor and often childish lifestyles. In keeping with the generic conventions of the sitcom, Rachel’s response to turning 30 is portrayed as a comedic overreaction. Yet, the narrative ultimately culminates with Rachel splitting up with her boyfriend to concentrate instead on her realising her long-term aims. In doing so, the episode clearly articulates some of the central tenets of postfeminist discourses of ageing and ‘time crisis’, which measure success through the attainment of particular life goals such as marriage and motherhood (Negra, 2009).

Introduction: Privilege and Difference in (Online) Feminist Activism

Online spaces have proven to be fertile ground for the growth of explicitly feminist activism and communities, with the emergence of many popular blogs, apps, and social media campaigns devoted to raising feminist consciousness and encouraging feminist action. Yet feminists continue to struggle with issues of privilege and difference in online spaces. Questions linger as to whether online feminist activism is accessible by and inclusive of working-class and poor women, women of color, queer and trans women, differently-abled women, women in developing countries, and individuals who do not identify as women. In our call for contributions to this issue of Commentary and Criticism, we asked authors to critically examine cases that illuminate both the affordances and limitations of online spaces for undertaking intersectional, feminist activism. Megan Fitzmaurice’s essay explores the case of the National Women’s History Cybermuseum in the United States, asking how online museums both enable marginalized groups to reclaim commemorative agency, yet uphold the inherent privilege of institutionalized memory places. Fitzmaurice sheds light on how the Cybermuseum represents a more inclusive, participatory version of feminist history than that which is often commemorated in brick-and-mortar museums, begging the question of whether feminist memory might be best served by investing in infrastructure that would enhance access and participation in such online feminist spaces. Gilda Seddighi draws on a combination of online and offline ethnography to pose the question of what happens when a protest group moves from offline-and-local to onlineand-transnationally-networked. She argues that the Iranian group Mothers of Park Laleh initially drew strength from the affective labor of women who met in physical space, but as the group shifted to an online, diasporic network, a different kind of affective labor became more valued. Seddighi provocatively questions what is lost when the kinds of social and cultural capital that are privileged in offline activism become more marginal in online spaces. Finally, Fredrika Thelandersson’s essay offers a timely response to ongoing debates about what has come to be called “tone policing” in online feminist networks. Thelandersson shows how the affordances of Twitter and Tumblr can turn conflicts around Feminist Media Studies, 2014 Vol. 14, No. 3, 519–530, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14680777.2014.909158

Introduction: Feminism, Media and the 1990s

A few months ago, we held a poll on our social media networks, offering followers the chance to vote on their favourite idea for an upcoming issue of Commentary and Criticism. Therefore, by popular demand we present this current issue on Feminism, Media and the 1990s. The essays collected here engage with a range of media examples from the 1990s, pushing beyond nostalgic remembering to consider what these examples may tell us about contemporary feminist issues, debates and media culture today.

Introduction: Gender and technologies of work

The two essays collected here consider the gendered dimensions of shifting cultures of work in response to the growing demands of the technologized/mediated workplace. Karen Levy’s essay explores the impact of new digital surveillance technologies on constructions of masculinity in the male-dominated US long-haul trucking industry. Jacquelyn Arcy draws upon feminist theories of ‘women’s work’ to consider gender in relation to digital immaterial labor, focusing specifically on emotion management. While looking at very different examples, both scholars illustrate how new technologies throw into sharp relief traditional constructions of gender and gendered labor.

Introduction: Sound and Vision

Feminist analysis of media is a field that has arguably been dominated by the visual. From selfies to music videos to films, feminist media scholars have done important work to unpack the way representations of gender look. But how does gender sound in contemporary media? How are femininity, masculinity, and other expressions of gender represented sonically across media platforms? This issue of Commentary and Criticism brings together essays that consider feminist approaches to sound in relation to a range of media. Shenila Khoja-Moolji’s essay explores the role of sound in the production of racialized masculinities through an analysis of the use, and presentation of, “Allahu Akbar” across different media. Considering the “affective intensities” of the association with violence given to this sound in some Western contexts, KhojaMoolji argues that further interrogation is needed of the way this phrase has been “reduced” in order to function as a “stand-in” for racialized, violent masculinities. Heather Warren-Crow’s essay similarly examines the role of sound in the production of gender, looking this time at femininity through an analysis of the aural phenomenon of “screaming like a girl” in online reaction videos, making broader connections with participatory media and feminized labor. Also examining the role of women’s voices, Manuel Garin and Amanda Villavieja’s essay discusses the use of asynchrony in the sound design of Chantal Akerman’s self-portrait films, arguing that it opens up opportunities for feminist scholars to think about sound strategies that resist the misogynistic associations of women’s voices and bodies in much mainstream narrative cinema. Finally, engaging with interdisciplinary approaches to the voice, Jennifer O’Meara’s essay asserts that despite the recent interest in gender inequalities in cinematic representations brought about by the introduction of “The Bechdel Test,” there has been very little attention paid to the vocal and verbal representation of women in contemporary cinema and in audio-visual media more broadly. The essay calls for a more nuanced analysis of the ways in which other markers such as age, race, and accent inflect the voice and are perceived by audiences.

Introduction: Gender, Media and Assisted Reproductive Technologies

The 2008 presidential nomination process had the most frontloaded schedule in history—both in the date of the first caucus and primary and the degree of compression in contests. The Iowa caucuses took place on January 3 rd , and the conventional wisdom was that nominations would be effectively decided once the “Super Duper Tuesday” primaries and caucuses took place on February 5 th, , the first day most states were able to hold a primary or caucus without incurring a penalty. Seeking to ensure that their voters had a chance to participate in a meaningful contest, 24 states rushed to hold their contests on February 5 th , nine months before the general election.

Introduction: Gendered Constructions of the Recession

Predatory mites constitute an important group owing to their potential in controlling the insect and mite pest populations well below the economic injury level. The most important predatory mites explored in this regard include members of Phytoseiidae, Cheyletidae, Cunaxidae, Stigmaeidae, Bdellidae, Tydeidae, Ascidae, Anystidae, Erythraeidae and some Tarsonemidae. The objective of using biocontrol agents is to restore and or to enhance the relationship between pests and their natural enemies either by reintroduction and or by creating the same habitat conditions under which the relationship would be strengthened or would form naturally. As a control tactic, biocontrol is most suited to pest species with a relatively high economic injury level. This is because a minimum prey density will usually be required to support a permanent predatory population. Of the 54 commercially available predator species for pest control used on a global level, 13 are predatory mites of the family Phytoseiidae.