ABSTRACT
This part features analysis of Hair's approach to the representation of gender, asserting that its playful, somewhat camp approach draws attention to gender as a social construct. This chapter discusses the character of Sheila to assert Hair's ambiguous approach to gender but further expands on this discussion by offering a detailed analysis of the songs ‘Black Boys/White Boys,’ which illustrates how both the female body and voice are used as acts of resistance against a dominant patriarchal society. The chapter concludes with a consideration of the character of Margaret Mead in order to illuminate how Hair uses playful strategies to reveal the social constructed nature of gender. Through reframing the female-identifying characters of the Tribe in these case studies, and situating them in their cultural moment, the chapter reveals how these characters typify the debates central to the early second-wave feminist movement.
