Abstract:
It has bee1l said that feminism is dead, but in fact feminism is alive in popular cultural
fonlls that offer pleasure, style, fUll and advice, as well as political messages that are
internalized alld continuously enacted in the lives of North American female youth. This
thesis discusses popular feminism with respect to mainstream girls' cultural discourses in
music alld magazine reading. Specifically this thesis examines the importance of
Madonna, Gwen Stefani, and the Spice Girls, in addition to the numerous girl magazines
available on the market today, such as Seventeen and YM. Focusing on the issue of the
feminine versus feminist polarity and its importance to girls' culture, this thesis attempts
to demonstrate how popular feminism can be used as a mode of empowerment and
illustrates the mode of consumption of popular feminist texts that frames female selfimage,
attitude, behaviour and speech. Through the employment of popular feminist
theories and a discourse alld semiotic analysis of musical lyrics, performance and style,
in addition to magazine reading and advertisements, this thesis highlights the use of
active media reading and being by girls to gaill an understanding with regards to social
positioning and postmodern political identity. More fundamentally, this thesis questions
how popular feminism disables, questions and critiques popular ideologies ill a
patriarchal society.
