+ info: Intellectbooks
Lesbians on Television. New Queer Visibility & The Lesbian Normal.
By Kate McNicholas Smith
£80.00 | 206 pages | 30 Nov 2020
The twenty-first century has seen LGBTQ+ rights emerge at the forefront of public discourse and national politics in ways that would once have been hard to imagine. This book offers a unique and layered account of the complex dynamics in the modern moment of social change, drawing together critical, social and cultural theory as well as empirical research, which includes interviews and multi-platform media analyses.
This original new study puts forward a much-needed analysis of twenty-first century television and lesbian visibility. Books addressing:
- the representation of lesbians have tended to focus on film.
- analysis of queer characters on television has usually focused on representations of gay males.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
‘Previously…’: Queer women on screen
‘The way that we live and love’: The L Word and the tensions of visibility
‘Homophobia is so old fashioned’: Skins and the lesbian normal
‘Skins’ truest legacy’: The counterpublics of the Naomily fandom
‘The nation’s favourite lesbian’: Coronation Street and the ‘everyday’ soap lesbian
‘New Directions’: Glee, new queer visibility and post-queer popular culture
‘A new kind of family’: The Fosters and the radical potential of the lesbian normal
Afterword: Reflections on the limits and possibilities of new queer visibility and the lesbian normal
Other recent books have attempted to address lesbian, gay and trans representation together, with the result that none are examined in sufficient detail – here, the exclusive focus on lesbian representation allows a fuller discussion.
