Exploring Gendered Performances In
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“WOW, THAT BITCH IS CRAZY!”: EXPLORING GENDERED PERFORMANCES IN LEISURE SPACES SURROUNDING REALITY TELEVISION by Callie Cross Spencer A dissertation submitted to the faculty of The University of Utah in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Parks, Recreation, and Tourism The University of Utah December 2014 Copyright © Callie Cross Spencer 2014 All Rights Reserved The University of Utah Graduate School STATEMENT OF DISSERTATION APPROVAL The dissertation of Callie Cross Spencer has been approved by the following supervisory committee members: Karen Paisley Chair 12/16/2013 Date Approved Mary S. Wells , Member 12/16/2013 Date Approved Matthew Brownlee , Member 12/16/2013 Date Approved Wanda Pillow , Member 12/16/2013 Date Approved Corey Johnson , Member 12/16/2013 Date Approved Robert Gehl Member 12/16/2013 Date Approved and by Kelly S. Bricker Chair of the Department of Parks, Recreation, and Tourism and by David B. Keida, Dean of The Graduate School. ABSTRACT In Reality Bites Back, Jennifer L. Pozner states, “Women are bitches. Women are stupid. Women are incompetent at work and failures at home. Women are gold diggers. How do we know? Because reality TV tells us so.” Not only does reality TV shape what we think about the “way things are,” it also shapes how we think about and perform our own subjectivities, “who we are” as gendered, sexed, raced, classed humans. If the messages sent by reality TV are that women are incompetent, stupid, gold-digging bitches, what are women doing with those messages? Are we incorporating such messages, and writing them on our bodies? Repurposing them? Reproducing them? Actively and strongly resisting them? In other words, what is the work (on subjectivity production) of watching reality TV (watching other women being watched)? The purpose of this dissertation was to take up that question by exploring the performative experiences of three women watching the 17th season of ABC’s The Bachelor. Using duoethnography, we explored how we challenged, (re)produced, assigned, and constructed gendered subjectivities both for ourselves and for each other through our performances within leisure spaces surrounding The Bachelor. In three layers of data-generative surveillance, we 1) videotaped ourselves watching the show; 2) publicly reflected about our experiences of watching the show in a blog (www.blogaboutthebachelor.com); and, 3) spent a weekend together watching the videotape of ourselves watching the show (a hyper-reflexive experience). Within the blog, we provided a space for women to react to, critique, support, or decenter messages sent by the show and one another. As such, the blog enacted a political project in order to decenter norms of practice offering more possibilities for gendered performance. In addition to this public political project, the results of our study as presented in five articles within this dissertation provide a methodological contribution to the body of knowledge by exploring what it means to do “empowering” “collaborative” feminist research. The ways in which we performed gendered subjectivities in reaction to messages sent by The Bachelor were inextricably entangled with the ways in which we performed gendered subjectivities as collaborative researchers. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT...........................................................................................................................iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.................................................................................................ix Chapters I. INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................... 1 Performing Gendered Subjectivity in Leisure Spaces.......................................................5 Gender as Performative....................................................................................................8 Subjectivity.....................................................................................................................10 Reality TV and Leisure Studies........................................................................................ 13 Watching Reality TV: Technology and Transmedia Storytelling..................................15 Why The Bachelor?........................................................................................................... 17 Research Questions............................................................................................................ 18 References..........................................................................................................................20 II. METHODOLOGY AND METHODS............................................................................27 Feminist Poststructural Influences.................................................................................... 27 The Performance Paradigm...............................................................................................29 Duoethnographic Methodology........................................................................................ 37 The Work of D uo........................................................................................................... 37 Tenet #1: Currere........................................................................................................... 38 Tenet #2: Polyvocal and Dialogic.................................................................................39 Tenet #3: Disrupts Metanarratives................................................................................40 Tenet #4: Difference......................................................................................................42 Tenet #5: Dialogic Change and Regenerative Transformation...................................43 Tenet #6: Trustworthiness Found in Self-Reflexivity, Not Validity and Truth Claims..............................................................................................................................45 Tenet #7: Audience Accessibility.................................................................................46 Tenet #8: Ethical Stances and Tenet #9: Trust............................................................47 Methods.............................................................................................................................. 48 Participants......................................................................................................................49 Settings............................................................................................................................50 Methods of Data Generation......................................................................................... 52 Data Analysis......................................................................................................................57 Creative Analytic Practice............................................................................................ 57 Deconstructing Performance......................................................................................... 58 Overview of Articles......................................................................................................... 61 References..........................................................................................................................62 III. ARTICLE 1: TWO WOMEN, A BOTTLE OF WINE, AND THE BACHELOR: DUOETHNOGRAPHY AS A MEANS TO EXPLORE EXPERIENCES OF FEMININITY IN A LEISURE SETTING..........................................................................68 Abstract............................................................................................................................... 69 Commercial Break............................................................................................................. 71 Commercial One: Duoethnography..............................................................................71 Commercial Two: The Leisure Experience of Watching Reality T V .......................72 Commercial Three: Studying Women's Leisure in the Third Wave of Feminism .... 73 Now Back to Our Show.....................................................................................................74 Commercial Break............................................................................................................. 79 Commercial One: Third Wave Feminism.................................................................... 79 Commercial Two: Creative Analytic Practice.............................................................79 Now Back to Our Show: Group Date...............................................................................81 What Do You Get When You Cross a Gingerbread with a Hooker? (Episode 2)....81 Fruit Cake. Insane. Certifiable. Nuts: Hometown Dates, Where Ben Goes to Meet Courtney's Parents (Episode 10)...................................................................................81 Am I Supposed to Be Wearing Wrinkle Cream?: During Commercial for Avon (Episode 7 )......................................................................................................................82 They Aren't Human-sized: During Commercials for KY-jelly and Weight Watchers (Episode 1)......................................................................................................................83 She Makes Me Want to Take My Nose Ring Out: Blakely and Rachel Have a Two- on-one Date