Doctoral Thesis
Bitch: the politics of angry women
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Murdoch University
2002
Abstract
'Bitch: the Politics of Angry Women' investigates the scholarly challenges and strengths in re theorising popular culture and feminism. It traces the connections and schisms between academic feminism and the feminism that punctuates popular culture. By tracing a series of specific bitch trajectories, this thesis accesses an archaeology of women?s battle to gain power.
Feminism is a large and brawling paradigm that struggles to incorporate a diversity of feminist voices. This thesis joins the fight. It argues that feminism is partly constituted through popular cultural representations. The separation between the academy and popular culture is damaging theoretically and politically. Academic feminism needs to work with the popular, as opposed to undermining or dismissing its relevancy.
Cultural studies provides the tools necessary to interpret popular modes of feminism. It allows a consideration of the discourses of race, gender, age and class that plait their way through any construction of feminism. I do not present an easy identity politics. These bitches refuse simple narratives. The chapters clash and interrogate one another, allowing difference its own space.
I mine a series of sites for feminist meanings and potential, ranging across television, popular music, governmental politics, feminist books and journals, magazines and the popular press. The original contribution to knowledge that this thesis proffers is the refusal to demarcate between popular feminism and academic feminism. A new space is established in which to dialogue between the two.
Details
- Title
- Bitch: the politics of angry women
- Authors/Creators
- Kylie Murphy
- Contributors
- Tara Brabazon (Supervisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Murdoch University; Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
- Identifiers
- 991005541164007891
- Murdoch Affiliation
- School of Media, Communication and Culture
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Doctoral Thesis
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