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Summary
Summary
WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FOR CRITICISM.
In this smart, funny, impassioned call to arms, a pop culture critic merges memoir and commentary to explore how our culture shapes ideas about who women are, what they are meant to be, and where they belong.
As a kid in the 1970s and '80s, Carina Chocano was confused by the mixed messages all around her: messages that told her who she could be--and who she couldn't. She grappled with sexed-up sidekicks, princesses waiting to be saved, and morally infallible angels who seemed to have no opinions of their own.
Chocano learned that "the girl" is not a person, but a man's idea of what a woman should be--she's whatever the hero needs her to be in order to become himself. Drawing from her years as a movie critic, Chocano unveils how stories in popular culture too often limits girls' lives and shapes their destinies. She resolved to rewrite her own story.
In You Play the Girl, Chocano blends formative personal stories with insightful and emotionally powerful analysis. Moving from Bugs Bunny to Playboy Bunnies, from Flashdance to Frozen, from the progressive '70s through the backlash '80s, the glib '90s, and the pornified aughts--and at stops in between--she explains how growing up in the shadow of "the girl" taught her to think about herself and the world and what it means to raise a daughter in the face of these contorted reflections.
In the tradition of Roxane Gay, Rebecca Solnit, and Susan Sontag, Chocano brilliantly shows that our identities are more fluid than we think, and certainly more complex than anything we see on any kind of screen.
"If Hollywood's treatment of women leaves you wanting, you'll find good, heady company in You Play the Girl."--Elle
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
In this whip-smart essay collection, pop culture critic Chocano explores representations of women in books, movies, and television, with characters ranging in time and temperament from Edith Wharton's Lily Bart to Mad Men's Joan and Peggy. Remarkably comprehensive and enjoyably associative, the essays move quickly from the haunting performances of French actress Isabelle Adjani to The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, Bewitched, and I Dream of Jeannie as allegories for the potential of powerful women to "wreck civilization." Chocano astutely observes that Thelma and Louise and Pretty Woman are "dueling metanarratives" from the same cultural moment, offering diametrically opposed messages about women's aspirations. On a personal note, Chocano describes her laborious efforts to raise a daughter without the patriarchy's cultural hangups via an extremely thorough examination of Disney's Frozen and its famous aria, asking-"What exactly is she letting go of?" Readers with even a rudimentary understanding of feminism may find it wearisome to have such seminal texts as Charlotte Perkins Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper (1892) and Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique (1963) rehashed; with a vast spectrum of material, and Chocano's incisive and witty approach, however, these essays will appeal to anyone interested in how women's stories are told. (Aug.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* In her hours of screenings and endless dissections of character arcs, successful film and television critic Chocano noticed that despite the relative progress women made in the twentieth century, twenty-first-century entertainment still completely fails to accurately and dynamically represent women. In this memoir-essay hybrid, Chocano shows how the industry continues to compartmentalize fictional women: as a mother, housewife, love interest, or the girl. This Chocano-coined girl is still the norm for female roles in Hollywood today. She's generally chill. She's the cute friend or coworker who can smoke marijuana and fart with the guys but still maintains a supremely feminine look and sexuality. The girl has become ubiquitous, but Chocano points out that she wasn't written in a vacuum. Through candid accounts of her own formative years, Chocano offers solace to a new generation of women dissatisfied with their representation in the media. She puts words to the numbing frustration she felt while watching Pretty Woman and explains the feminist satisfaction of such premieres as Thelma and Louise and Nancy Meyers' Private Benjamin. Chocano's encyclopedic knowledge of film, literature, and television, plus her wickedly funny, wildly unapologetic, and intimately conversational voice, will leave readers wanting more and more.--Eathorne, Courtney Copyright 2017 Booklist
Library Journal Review
Every woman often faces the unwelcome prospect of "playing the girl." These essays by journalist Chocano, inspired by Lewis Carroll's Alice, lead readers on a journey to identify and understand just who this girl is and from where she originates. The author interweaves relevant personal stories from her childhood and adult experiences with an entertaining and insightful review of female characters from the last 50 years of pop culture, including television, film and literature. Chocano not only looks back at her own experiences, she also writes emotionally about the realities of the world that her young daughter faces today. Each piece combines numerous, well-connected examples from the author's extensive knowledge of pop culture, with an analysis of a theme related to the various aspects of women's lives: work, relationships, marriage, sexuality, motherhood, and even math. As a result, the essays have a sound research foundation and are well documented. VERDICT This entertaining, engaging, enlightening tour of the portrayal of women in pop culture will appeal to general readers and researchers in a variety of cross-disciplinary fields.-Theresa Muraski, Univ. of Wisconsin-Stevens Point Lib. © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Table of Contents
Introduction | p. xiii |
Part 1 Down the Rabbit Hole | |
1 Bunnies | p. 3 |
2 Can This Marriage Be Saved? | p. 17 |
3 The Bronze Statue of the Virgin Slut Ice Queen Bitch Goddess | p. 47 |
4 What a Feeling | p. 58 |
5 The Eternal Allure of the Basket Case | p. 75 |
Part 2 The Pool of Tears | |
6 The Ingenue Chooses Marriage or Death | p. 91 |
7 Thoroughly Modern Lily | p. 105 |
8 Bad Girlfriend | p. 113 |
9 The Kick-Ass | p. 120 |
Part 3 You Wouldn't Have Come Here | |
10 Surreal Housewives | p. 133 |
11 Real Girls | p. 141 |
12 Celebrity Gothic | p. 149 |
13 Big Mouth Strikes Again | p. 157 |
14 The Redemptive Journey | p. 177 |
15 A Modest Proposal for More Backstabbing in Preschool | p. 189 |
Part 4 A Mad Tea Party | |
16 Let It Go | p. 201 |
17 All the Bad Guys Are Girls | p. 218 |
18 Girls Love Math | p. 223 |
19 Train Wreck | p. 230 |
20 Look at Yourself | p. 239 |
21 Phantombusters; or, I Want a Feminist Dance Number | p. 248 |
Acknowledgments | p. 261 |
Notes | p. 264 |
Works Consulted | p. 271 |