Difficult Women: Post/Feminism in Television Comedies and Dramedies
CHUM 397
Spring 2025
| Section:
01
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| Crosslisting:
AMST 391, ANTH 397, FGSS 397, FILM 202 |
| Course Cluster and Certificates: Social, Cultural, and Critical Theory Certificate |
Although postwar family sitcoms represented women as homemakers, one of the first and most popular sitcom wives also articulated discontent with domestic femininity. Lucy Ricardo became the prototype of the "unruly woman," a figure with feminist potential whose desires exceed and disrupt dominant gender norms. As those norms have shifted, so have TV's unruly women. Second-wave feminism, anticipated in I Love Lucy, was incorporated into a 1970s cycle of comedies centered on single working women whose career aspirations were rewarded. Over the following decades, a postfeminist sensibility dominated television comedies and dramas and became central to a gendered neoliberalism in which energetic individuals "empower" themselves. In recent years, a new type of female protagonist has emerged. Alongside the can-do optimism of single-women comedies from The Mary Tyler Moore Show to Sex and the City to 30 Rock and Parks and Rec, a stream of comedies and dramedies, made largely by and for women, have depicted a variety of flawed, difficult, unruly women coming of age under conditions of socioeconomic precarity, whose less focused energies seem to articulate a more uncertain, downbeat, post-recessional mood. In this course we will situate the latter cycle in relation to both the longer history of televisual representations of women and to the current state of feminist politics. Among the shows we will look at are: I Love Lucy, Bewitched, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Sex and the City, Ally McBeal, Girlfriends, The Mindy Project, 30 Rock, Parks and Rec, Girls, Insecure, Broad City, Better Things, Two Broke Girls, New Girl, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Jane the Virgin, Unreal, Abbott Elementary, Fleabag, Dear White People, and Somebody Somewhere. |
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| Credit: 1 |
Gen Ed Area Dept:
HA CHUM |
| Course Format: Seminar | Grading Mode: Graded |
| Level: UGRD |
Prerequisites: None |
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Fulfills a Major Requirement for: None |
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Past Enrollment Probability: Not Available |
| SECTION 01 |
Major Readings: Wesleyan RJ Julia Bookstore
Readings will include articles and book chapters by Angela McRobbie, Rosalind Gill, Sarah Banet-Weiser, Diane Negra, Yvonne Tasker, Rebecca Wanzo, Julie Havas, Maria Sulimma, Sarah Hagelin, Gillian Silverman, Taylor Nygaard, Jorie Lagerwey, and Michael Szalay.
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Examinations and Assignments:
Weekly research journal; short (5 page) paper developed from a journal entry; final (10-12 page) research paper |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
Approximately 2 hours of assigned viewing for each class. Students (in pairs) will take a turn at facilitating class discussion. |
| Instructor(s): Traube,Elizabeth G. Times: ...W... 07:10PM-10:00PM; Location: TBA |
Permission of Instructor Required
Enrollment capacity: 15 | Permission of instructor approval will be granted by the instructor during pre-registration through the Electronic Portfolio. Click "Add to My Courses" and "To request a POI electronically, click here" to submit your request. |
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