ABSTRACT
Since launching in 2012, Girls has generated impassioned online commentary about feminism, intersectionality and the representation of women of colour in US television shows. The HBO comedy-drama chronicles the ostensibly imperfect and uncensored lives of four ‘twenty-something’ millennial white women in New York. Responses to Girls that situate it within feminist narratives, include celebratory claims that Girls foregrounds depictions of women that are not primarily constructed in relation to men or their imagined gaze. Critiques of Girls via intersectional analytical lenses have explored how socio – political dynamics related to race and gender may be embedded in the content of Girls, as well as commentary that frames it as being a feminist phenomenon. Such responses emphasise the scarcity of portrayals of women of colour in Girls, in addition to deconstructing claims that Girls is exemplary of feminist popular culture and has advanced the representation of women in US television shows. Approached from an intersectional Black feminist perspective, Sobande’s work analyses online articles about Girls to address three questions: When Girls is framed as being feminist, what feminist narratives are mobilised and why? What do such narratives and critiques of them illuminate about 21st century societal perceptions of feminism, intersectionality, as well as the intersection of feminism and popular culture? Is the dearth of depictions of women of colour in Girls addressed or overlooked amidst such responses and how does this function as part of such commentary?
