Digital Femininities: The Gendered Construction of Cultural and Political Identities Online

Digital Femininities: The Gendered Construction of Cultural and Political Identities Online examines the role of new media technologies in the production of girls’  cultural and political identities. The book argues that the varied and  complex spaces which make up our ‘social media’ should be conceptualised  as important terrains upon which neoliberal and postfeminist  subjectivities can be both reproduced and subverted. In doing so, the  book explores many key issues underpinning current debates around gender  politics and digital media, including gendered spatial politics,  visibility, surveillance and regulation, beauty politics, and civic and  political engagement and activism. 

Over the last  decade, the position of girls and young women within the digital  landscape of social media has been a topic of much debate. On the one  hand, girls’ social media practices are presented as a key site of  concern, wherein new digital technologies are said to have produced an  intensification of individualised, neoliberal and postfeminist  identities. Conversely, others have championed access to social media  for young people as a potentially useful political tool, enabling  previously marginalised political subjects (such as girls) to access and  participate within new and exciting political cultures. Locating itself  at the intersection of these two approaches, this book offers a fresh  contribution to these debates. Based upon the findings from focus groups  with girls and young women aged between 12 and 18 in England, the book  offers an in-depth analysis of the digital cultures that emerged from  the study. 

This timely book will be essential  reading for anyone interested in contemporary femininity and feminism  and the role of digital media in the production of cultural, political  and gendered identities.