POSTFEMINIST FEMININITY IN POP CULTURE DISCOURSES OF THE 1990s AND 2000s

Abstract

The concept of postfeminism has become one of the central and most important concepts in feminist cultural studies continually raising a lot of debates and discussions. As an important social and cultural phenomenon, postfeminism has extensively invaded popcultural and media spaces at the turn of the last century, and by doing so has drastically (re)shaped the very concept of femininity in mass culture of the 1990s and early 2000s. The controversial nature of postfeminism has created a new concept of femininity, which was located outside of both patriarchal and feminist discourses. The purpose of this article is to analyse postfeminist femininity in various popular TV series and films of the time, locate their representations of femininity within the existing contemporary postfeminist discourse and trace its impacts on the modern understanding of womanhood. The research methodology consists of comparative analysis and synthesis methods, which have made it possible to identify the main features and key concepts of postfeminism as socio-cultural phenomenon. The historical and cultural approaches as well as the systemic method have allowed us to understand the influence of postfeminism on pop-culture as well as to trace its multifaceted relations to public media discourses. The elements of critical and content analyses, as well as the complex processes decomposition method, were used for the assessment of postfeminist theory as a concept-methodological basis for the further analysis of media products in their relation to postfeminist discourses. The scientific novelty lies in analysing the unique sensibilities typical for postfeminism and applying this theoretical knowledge to reinvent female images in pop culture discourses, thus offering a new approach to understanding femininity outside the patriarchal narratives as well as second- and third-wave feminism. Conclusions. The findings of the article provide a new perspective on popular and well-known products of the media industry of the 1990s and 2000s, re-read them within the scope of the postfeminist framework, and offer a new angle of interpretation of femininity at the turn of the last century.