Article
The Discursive Construction and Performance of Gendered Identity on Social Media
Current Sociology
(2014)
Abstract
This article looks at the construction and performance of gendered identity through a sub-section of Facebook web pages belonging to the Slut Walk movement. Our analysis suggests that gender is constructed through the subjects’ participation in the ‘post-feminist masquerade’ through which their gendered identity is defined in relation to a hegemonic masculine ideal. This situates the web pages within a space characterized through the ambivalent and appropriative treatment of feminism and further, coiled within an acute tension between feminist and post-feminist discourses. Acts of resistance are framed as individual, momentary ruptures of Judith Butler’s heterosexual matrix of ‘cultural intelligibility.’ The online context of these ruptures is found to vest a creative potential, by removing the constraints of time and location, indicating that the impact of these ruptures may extend beyond its immediate environment.
Keywords
- Gender identity,
- feminism,
- Slut Walk,
- social media,
- Facebook,
- resistance
Disciplines
Publication Date
2014
Citation Information
Cook, J. and Hasmath, R. (2014) “The Discursive Construction and Performance of Gendered Identity on Social Media”, Current Sociology 62(7): 975-993.