Butch Lesbians: Televising Female Masculinity

  • Helen Fenwick
Chapter

Abstract

Critical accounts of lesbian representation have been enduringly vexed by the contentious and polysemic status of the term “lesbian”. As Judith Butler explains in “Imitation and Gender Insubordination”, it is “permanently unclear what that sign [lesbian] signifies”. While Butler embraces the freedom that this ambiguity represents, pointing to the fact that “identity categories tend to be instruments of regulatory regimes” (13–14), Elaine Marks has observed that “a sense of identity”, however fictitious, remains essential to understanding the ways in which different identities are formed and interrogated within any given society (110; emphasis added). In exploring the nuances of lesbian representation, then, we need to establish “a sense of [lesbian] identity” in order to address key questions about on-screen images of lesbianism: How is lesbianism represented within visual culture? How, if at all, do representations of lesbians shape impressions of, and approaches to, lesbianism in wider society? Why does it matter if lesbians are represented in ways that are positive, negative, or even authentic?

Keywords

Black Woman Female Masculinity Walk Away Police Commissioner True Police 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Copyright information

© Helen Fenwick 2011

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  • Helen Fenwick

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