Ageing and unruliness: Articulations of gaga feminism in representations of ageing, gender and sexuality

Abstract

In prevailing Western media discourses, older women’s anger and resistance are often portrayed as a result of the physical and mental decline inherently associated with ageing. These representations reinforce the image of older women as vulnerable subjects who are weak, frail and excluded from society. This article proposes an alternative reading of expressions of unruliness related to ageing, gender and sexuality in Western media and visual culture through the lens of Halberstam’s concept of gaga feminism. The aim is to explore how gaga feminism’s aesthetics of collapse, creative anarchy and experimentation can construct new constellations of ageing, sexuality and gender. We have conducted a critical, contextualised reading of a selection of cultural artefacts that express various elements of a gaga aesthetic. Our analysis reflects on the three central principles of gaga, specifically (1) new forms of social relations and sexualities, (2) more fluid articulations of gender and (3) creative anarchy; and on what they can mean for an anti-ageist project in media and visual culture. In this way, this article offers insights into the creative and unruly ways in which ageism, heteronormativity and sexism can be subverted and destabilised in representations.