Table Of ContentFeminist cultural theory
Feminist cultural theory
process and production
EDITED BY BEVERLEY SKEGGS
MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS
Manchester and New York
distributed exclusively in the USA and Canada by St. Martin’s Press
Copyright © Manchester University Press 1995
While copyright in the volume as a whole is vested in Manchester University Press,
copyright in individual chapters belongs to their respective authors, and no chapter
may be reproduced wholly or in part without the express permission in writing of both
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Published by Manchester University Press
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Distributed exclusively in the USA and Canada
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Feminist cultural theory : process and production / edited by Beverley Skeggs.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-7190-4470-7. - ISBN 0-7190-4471-5 (pbk.)
1. Feminist theory - Methodology. 2. Feminist criticism.
I. Skeggs, Beverley.
HQ1190.F445 1995
305.42*01 - dc20 95-3502 CIP
ISBN 0 7190 4470 7 hardback
ISBN 0 7190 4471 5 paperback
First published in 1995
99 98 97 96 95 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in Great Britain
by Biddles Ltd, Guildford and King's Lynn
Contents
Contributors page vii
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction
BEVERLEY SKEGGS 1
PART ONE: TEXTS AND RESPONSES
1 The rights and wrongs of culture: issues of theory and
methodology
CELIA LURY 33
2 Studying Roseanne
KATHLEEN ROWE 46
3 Common knowledge: the 'nature' of historical evidence
JANET THUMIM 62
4 Finding a place from which to write: the methodology
of feminist textual practice
LYNNE PEARCE 81
5 The lost audience: methodology, cinema history and
feminist film criticism
JACKIE STACEY 97
6 Writing Femininity in Dissent
ALISON YOUNG 119
vi CONTENTS
PART TWO: RESPONSES AND TEXTS
7 Mothers watching children watching television
ELLEN SEITER 137
8 I want to tell you a story: the narratives of Video Playtime
ANN GRAY 153
9 Questioning the 'ordinary' woman: Oranges are not
the Only Fruit, text and viewer
JULIA HALLAM and MARGARET MARSHMENT 169
10 Theorising, ethics and representation in feminist
ethnography
BEVERLEY SKEGGS 190
11 The personal, the professional and the partner(ship):
the husband/wife collaboration of Charles and Ray Eames
PAT KIRKHAM 207
Index 227
Contributors
Ann Gray lectures in the Department of Cultural Studies at the University
of Birmingham. She is currently working in areas around consumption
and everyday life, and writing a book on research methods. She is the
author of Video Playtime (Routledge, 1992).
Julia Hallam lectures in Film and Communication Studies at Liverpool
University. She has published articles on femininity and feminist
methodology and is currently completing her doctorate on representa
tion and recruitment in the nursing profession.
Pat Kirkham is Professor of Design History and Cultural Studies at De
Montfort University, Leicester. She has written widely on design, gender
and film. Her books on design include A View From The Interior:
Feminism, Women and Design, edited with Judy Attfield (The Women's
Press, 1989), her study of Charles and Ray Eames (MIT Press, 1995) and
The Gendered Object (edited anthology, MUP, 1996).
Celia Lury is Co-Director of the Centre for Women's Studies (with
Beverley Skeggs). She also teaches Women’s Studies and Cultural Studies
in the Sociology Department, Lancaster University. Her research interests
are popular culture, identity and consumer culture. She is the author
of Cultural Rights (Routledge, 1993).
Margaret Marshment lectures in Media and Cultural Studies at Liverpool
John Moores University. She is co-editor of The Female Gaze (The
Women's Press, 1988) and has published articles on feminism and
representation.
Lynne Pearce teaches English and Women’s Studies at Lancaster Univer
sity. She is co-author of Feminist Readings/Feminists Reading (1989)
and author of Women, Image, Text (1991) and Reading Dialogics (1994).
Her next project, Feminism and the PoHtics of Reading, will combine a
selection of her published essays on reader-positioning.
Kathleen Rowe is an Assistant Professor of Film Studies in the Depart
ment of English at the University of Oregon. She has published articles
in Screen, The Journal of Film and Video, and other feminist criticism
on film and television. She is the author of The Unruly Woman: Gender
and the Genres of Laughter (University of Texas Press, 1995).
CONTRIBUTORS
Ellen Seiter teaches Media Studies in the Department of Telecommunica
tions at Indiana University, where she also serves as graduate director.
She is the author of Sold Separately: Children and Parents in Consumer
Culture (Rutgers University Press, 1993) and co-editor of Remote Control:
Television, Audiences and Cultural Power [Routledge, 1989). Her articles
on film and television have appeared in Cultural Studies, Screen, Feminist
Review, Journal of Communication, and many other scholarly journals.
Beverley Skeggs is Co-Director (with Celia Lury) of the Centre for
Women's Studies, University of Lancaster where she teaches courses on
Feminist Methodology and Theory. She is the author of The Media
(Nelson, 1992), numerous articles on ethnography, music and culture,
and of the forthcoming books on Becoming Respectable and Black
Symbol/White Distinctions.
Jackie Stacey produced this chapter from Star Gazing: Hollywood Cinema
and Female Spectators hip (Routledge, 1994). She taught in the Depart
ment of Sociology at Lancaster University from 1988-1994. In October
1994 she started working in the Centre for the Study of Women and
Gender at the University of Warwick, returning to Lancaster in 1995.
She is co-editor of Off-Centre: Feminism and Cultural Studies, with
Sarah Franklin and Celia Lury (Routledge, 1991); Working Out: New
Directions for Women’s Studies, with Hilary Hinds and Ann Phoenix
(Falmer Press, 1992); Romance Revisited, with Lynne Pearce (Lawrence
and Wishart, 1995). She is presently working on a new book entitled:
Teratologies: Gender, Cancer and Health Cultures. She is also an editor
of the journal Screen.
Janet Thumin teaches Film and Television Studies at the University of
Bristol Department of Drama, Theatre, Film, Television. She is the
author of Celluloid Sisters: Women and Popular Cinema (Macmillan,
1992) and editor, with Pat Kirkham, of two collections of essays about
the construction of masculinity in the cinema, You Tarzan: Masculinity,
Movies and Men (Lawrence and Wishart, 1993) and Me fane: Masculinity,
Movies and Women (Lawrence and Wishart, 1995, forthcoming). She
is currently researching the relation between women and broadcast
television in the UK in the 1950s and 1960s.
Acknowledgements
I would firstly like to thank all the women who gave me access to their
lives to make my research possible. I will remain grateful always to Mary
Mullaney, Karen Smith, Angela Shatwell, Jane Capewell, Sarah Hart, Sue
Cliffe, Jane McDowell, Alison Jane Scholtze, Jo Harrop, Michelle Murphy,
Julie Dodd, Sue Callary, Marie Allen, Janet Winton, Caroline Brammeld,
Michelle Powell, Catherine Tilley, Beverley Vaughn, Diane Gilbert,
Michelle Davies, Michelle Kidson, Lynette Hughes, Alicia Drinkwater,
Debbie Snell, Pam Clarke, Jackie Hargrove, Carol James, Amanda
Jefferies, Babs Naylor, Wendy Owen, Yvonne Worrall, Sharon Worrall,
Rachel Cooke, Sue Cottrell, Darren Eyes, Darren Fowles, Ann-Marie
Egerton, Kerry Gandy, Kate Evans, Lynne Astles, Andrea Berry, Julie
Preen, Louise Potts, Diane Ratcliffe, Andrea Read, Julie Shallcross, Kate
Townsend, Shirley Tracey, Elizabeth Wilson, Catherine Tilley, Janice
Worrall, Louise Williams, Karen Welch, Sheila Bailey.
So many friends have contributed to my thinking and my sustenance.
Val Atkinson, Jean Grugel, Nickie Whitham and Pat Kirkham have con
tinued to debate with me through good and bad times. I owe them lots.
Alex Callinicos, Denis Gleeson, T. V. Sathyamurthy and Mary Maynard
were formative influences. Chris Griffin has also been an inspiration right
from the start. My first colleagues, Erica Stratta, Kate Berry and Catherine
Neale remain inspiring. Mairtin Mac an Ghaill and Joe Bristow are
excellent examples of what can be done. At the Centre for Women's
Studies, Lancaster, I have the best colleagues I could ever wish for; they
are intellectually stimulating, rigorous, generous, enjoyable and good
friends, especially: Celia Lury, Rosemary Deem, Lynne Pearce, Alison
Young and Jackie Stacey and my WS201, MA and PhD students have
helped me to clarify my thoughts and Janet Hartley and Cathie Holt's
stalwart efforts continually provide excellent support. Thanks.
I'd like to thank the contributors who struggled to meet deadlines and
Katharine Reeve (from MUP) who initiated this project. Amos Zamor-
ski provided love and music. My wonderful parents provided support,
love (and food, when desperate).
