Blog Post #4 - My response to the article "Branding the Post Feminist Self: Girls' Video Production and YouTube" by Sarah Banet-Weister

The article, “Branding the Post-Feminist Self: Girls’ Video Production and YouTube” by Sarah Banet -Weister particularly caught my attention because of the fact that YouTube is such a widely use media site. I had never looked at YouTube in such a different light, especially in a light dealing with post-feminine characteristics. The article describes the way digital media may be changing the way girls and women in particular view themselves and how others view them in conversation with digital media sites. YouTube in specific is a site that allows for self-expression and allows for others to not only express themselves but view and make conclusions of others self-expressions.  

                When I read this article the conclusion that I came to was that Banet-Weiser was seeing how the idea of feminism has changed and become more mainstream through the use of digital media. She describes certain YouTube videos that display young girls having fun and singing or dancing (basically just expressing themselves) as an outlet of self-branding and empowerment. She describes YouTube slogan “Broadcast Yourself!” as “a way to brand oneself, a practice deployed by individuals to communicate personal values, ideas, and beliefs using strategies and logic from commercial brand culture, and one that is increasingly normative in the contemporary neoliberal economic environment,” (2). Basically what she is trying to say (at least what I think she is trying to say) is that because YouTube allows for this ability of people to express many things such as “values, ideas and beliefs” it Is a perfect outlet for a new discourse to emerge. In this article she is saying that YouTube has allowed for the discourse of post-feminism to appear and develop through the fact that it gives girls and women the ability to act out their post-feminist ideals and feelings through silly YouTube videos.

                The one part of the article that I found most intriguing was when she describes in-depth a specific YouTube video of a group 13 year old girls dancing and singing to the song “I’m a Barbie Girl” by Aqua. She basically makes various assumptions and distinctions about the way that the girls act during this performance. The idea of a “Barbie” seems to me to be as the inherent assumption of pure femininity. The way that they tweak and challenge the limits of this femininity by making fun of and acting out in a slightly “un-feminine” way (the way they cut Ken’s head off) gives light to the post-feminine discourse. Though throughout the video Banet- Weister describes the girls as engaging in certain feminist practices such as “feminist grooming practices: (where) one girl is looking at a teen magazine with Paris Hilton on the cover, while the other is occupied by dramatically brushing the hair of a small toy dog,” (8) Banet -Weister also describes the way they are engaging in these practices are dramatic and in a mocking way. Banet-Weister describes the girls as “clearly mocking celebrity as well as beauty culture,” (8).  Finally the post-feminine discourse is high-lighted when the girls cut off Ken’s head. Banet-Weister describes this as a “political ending” where the girls are highlighting the fact that in their post-modern world they do not need Ken – (“chopping Ken’s head off clearly calls into question his role as a crucial part of Barbie’s world). Banet-Weister also describes the girls as displaying a different kind of “public femininity” (8). I think what she is saying is that the original idea of “public femininity” was more rigid and strategic than it is now. For example back in the 1950s it would be shocking and “un-feminine” for girls to be mocking beauty and celebrity culture and cutting off a male doll’s head.

                Banet-Weister also uses these YouTube videos as a way to show the new self-branding post-feminist empowered culture. She describes the ability of girls to express themselves and “sell” themselves via performances such as these as a way for girls to empower themselves. The way they are “empowering” themselves is through the ability to proudly express their opposition to traditional feminist views. The “13 year old Barbie Girls” are making fun of the feminine practices and also pointing out that they don’t need a man like the real Barbie might. As Banet- Weister points out “this kind of self-branding is thus not just a tired re-hashing of the objectification of female bodies, but rather a new social arrangement, one that relies of strategies for identity construction that get their logic from more progressive ideals such as capability, empowerment, and imagination,” (10).

                At the end of her article she looks at these self-branding expressions in a different light. She shows that even though there is a new post-feminist discourse where young girls are taking control of their “self-brands” by acting how they want and showing people their own personal self-expressions these self-expressions still bring a great deal of feedback that still sticks to the same old feminine discourse that we are used to. The idea that girls making up these dance and posting them on the internet are either a reason for others to objectify them or also a reason for others to scold them as being too “sexually explicit” at such a young age. In the end I think what she is trying to say is that though there will always be people that oppose this new post-feminine discourse, there is still a discourse that has given birth to the ability of young girls to express and empower themselves.


Jessica W.


(Sorry this is a day late guys - I totally thought I had posted it and then looked on the blog to see if anyone commented on my post and realized I couldn't find it... because I blanked out and forgot to post it!)