Online Feminist Research Articles

From Digital Satire to Feminist Counterpublic Discourse: A Study of Participatory Mashups in China During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged the effectiveness of China’s state apparatus and accumulated social discontent in the first half of 2020. Aided by a creative adaptation of a popular music video, a group of Chinese feminists initiated a short-term movement on the Chinese Internet in protest of the propaganda campaign of the Communist Youth League of China. The debut of two anime characters (Jiangshanjiao and Hongqiman) amid the pandemic stirred up strong grievances which led to an online feminist movement. Utilizing mashup videos, the movement, though ephemera, delivered a powerful counter-public discourse of women’s sufferings, which resonated widely in the digital sphere. Adopting a cultural perspective of Internet memes, this study closely examined the metamorphosis of a music video from an apolitical fanatic tool to sarcastic “guichu” mashups and eventually a powerful feminist counter-public discourse. Findings from this study suggest the strong potential of participatory mashups in the articulation of counter-public narratives from grassroots Internet users.

Digital Feminism, Public Theology, and the Reshaping of Female Subjectivity in Ghana

Abstract Taking the online feminist group Pepper Dem Ministries as a case study, this article assesses how a public theological approach to gender activism underlies public gender discourses by allowing online feminism to attain global-local and post-colonial dimensions. This is explored through a rhetorical analysis of Pepper Dem Ministries’ online and offline discourses, and the response of young Christian women to their activism. These responses are obtained from semi-structured interviews conducted via zoom calls. The discourse of identity fragmentation in modernity frames the analysis of this data, revealing the coherence of Pepper Dem Ministries’ rhetoric with fragmentary or unsystematic theology as a mode of public theological engagement. The article concludes that the social shaping of female subjectivity in Ghana transpires as a public theological discourse influenced by and coherent with global discursive patterns in online feminism, Christian and secular feminist discourse, and public theology.

From meme-making trolls to feminist artists: digital feminist art activism in contemporary South Korea

ABSTRACT This article explores the activism of Silent Megaphone, a Korean feminist artist group. By examining the experiences of Silent Megaphone members, their artworks, and exhibitions, this study argues that the sexist regulations of online platforms drove the meme-producers to enter the realm of feminist art, transforming them from anonymous women to feminist artists with authorship. This transition allowed them to rearrange the aims and styles of their activism, appropriate the practices of online and offline realms, and connect with the broader feminist artist community, establishing a network encompassing both their online feminist group and an unexpected cohort of feminist artists spanning generations, and creating a safe space for their fellow feminists.

Calling out Feminists: Antifeminist Hijacking of Cancel Culture in South Korea

This paper examines the antifeminist appropriation of cancel culture in South Korea, focusing on the controversy surrounding the finger-pinching motif, allegedly associated with Megalia, a now-defunct feminist online community. While cancel culture originated from marginalized groups challenging systemic injustices, it is now appropriated by dominant groups to reinforce social structures—in this case, to protect male privilege and undermine feminism. The study reveals how antifeminist canceling in the country has extended over the years beyond subcultural industries to companies, government agencies, and public institutions. Although both feminists and antifeminists engage in cancel practices, antifeminist canceling has led to the removal of numerous advertisements and the sanctioning of women and precarious workers, reflecting the fundamental gender power imbalance in South Korea. By examining social, public, and institutional responses, I argue that such institutional enforcement upholds and reproduces the antifeminist hijacking of cancel culture, further silencing marginalized communities.

Riot Like a Girl? Gender-Stereotypical Associations Boost Support for Feminist Online Campaigns

The current study examined whether congruence with gender stereotypes is associated with support for online feminist campaigns. In Study 1 (Ntweets = 510,000), we investigated how two real-world movements (i.e., #metoo and #sexstrike) were viewed in terms of adhering to the traditional feminine stereotype of high warmth/communion and low competence/agency, as per language used in the tweets posted within each campaign. We found that the #metoo movement was characterised by more communal and less agentic content than #sexstrike. In Study 2 (N = 195), when presented with descriptions of the movements modelled after #metoo and #sexstrike, participants associated the #metoo-like campaign with more feminine (e.g., community orientation) and less masculine concepts (e.g., rebelliousness), which, in turn, translated to greater declared support for the campaign. In Study 3 (N = 446), conducted in a more controlled and context-independent setting, we once again observed the link between the gender stereotypes attached to feminist movements and the support they received. We also found that this effect was independent of the effect of perceiving movements as violating social norms. Controlling for feminist identification, political conservatism, and gender system justification did not affect the pattern of results. Uncovering these stereotype-related effects on support for feminist movements furthers understanding of the strategies that might be used in the fight for gender equality.

Unveiling gender inequality in the US: Testing validity of a state-level measure of gender inequality and its relationship with feminist online collective action on Twitter.

The Gender Inequality Index is a country-level measure of gender inequality based on women's levels of reproductive health, social and political empowerment, and labor-market representation. In two studies, we tested the validity of the GII-S, a state-level measure of gender inequality in the USA. In Study 1, the GII-S was associated with objective and subjective measures of wellness among women, including life satisfaction, financial well-being, and perceptions of safety. GII-S was not associated with the Gini coefficient, a well-established measure of economic inequality, suggesting that gender and economic disparities represent distinct aspects of social inequality. Study 2 tested the link between GII-S scores and collective action-specifically, participation in the #MeToo movement promoting awareness of sexual harassment and violence against women. Analysis of geo-localized messages on the Twitter social media platform reveals that higher GII-S scores were associated with fewer tweets containing the #MeToo hashtag. Moreover, GII-S was associated with state-level political orientation: the more conservative a state, the higher its level of gender inequality. Results are discussed in terms of possible socio-cognitive processes underpinning the association between gender inequality and sensitivity to violence against women.

The relationship between feminist collective action and social media engagement

Purpose This study aims to investigate the impact of online collective feminist actions on social media participation and the perceived value of social media as part of the social identity model of collective action (SIMCA). Design/methodology/approach A mixed methodology is used. Within the SIMCA model in the context of feminist collective actions, social identity, group-efficacy and fear predicted the intention of online collective action participation in the first part (quantitative) of the study. Contrary to predictions, the influence of anger on the intention to participate in collective action was negative. In-depth interviews are conducted in the study’s second (qualitative) part to investigate why individuals do not participate in collective actions despite their anger at violence against women. Findings The concept of online feminist collective action, from the perspective of the SIMCA model, deals with violence against women in the context of social marketing, revealing the importance of online collective actions as an antecedent of social media participation and the perceived value of social media. The possible causes of the negative impact of anger, which is an important emotion within the framework of the SIMCA model, on online feminist collective action were determined, and a contribution was made to the social marketing literature in the context of women’s rights. Originality/value The study makes three major contributions to the literature. First, women’s rights are addressed in the context of online collective action, an issue that has received little attention in social marketing. Second, in the context of the social identity theory of collective action, online collective feminist action and its predecessors are addressed. Finally, the Turkish case is used to highlight the probable causes of anger’s negative impact on collective action.

Reclaiming Power or Reinforcing Inequities: Exploring Egg Freezing Debates on Social Media

ABSTRACT In China, unmarried women are prohibited from egg freezing despite high demand and declining fertility rates. Within such a context, this article aims to examine public attitudes toward reproduction and egg-freezing on social media, with particular attention paid to how these discussions reflect the multi-level determinants influencing decision-making regarding egg-freezing practices. Within the context of Chinese gender ideology, we conducted a critical discourse analysis of 1,437 Weibo posts discussing egg-freezing. Our analysis identified four significant themes: reconstructing romantic relationships and family structures, conspiracy theories and distrust surrounding assisted reproduction, exposing and challenging reproductive policies within a patriarchal framework, and interconnections and stratification among women. Accentuated by the egg-freezing discourse, we argue that current Chinese women’s bodily autonomy is entangled with traditional norms and state control, underscoring the intricate interplay between individual choice and societal dynamics, as well as the ideological contradictions at the intersection of Western technological influence and Chinese societal structures. Furthermore, we illuminate the challenging landscape faced by online feminist movements within such a complex context. Our findings set the stage for shaping future initiatives focused on advancing reproductive justice and empowering fertility choices among Chinese women.

Ambivalent effects of anger in Chinese feminists’ refusal to patriarchal marriage and family

ABSTRACT Studies have shown that emotions play an important role in the emergence, unfolding, and demise of social movements. Many studies argue that anger is one of the most propelling emotions promoting movement participation, while others demonstrate the ambivalence of anger within social movements. Previous studies have suggested that the context in which emotions play a role in social movements remains underexplored. This study focuses on the self-organized feminist online space, where the political and private dimensions overlap, and contextualizes anger among online feminists who question the inferior position of women in patriarchal marriage, the family, and women’s low social status in contemporary China. Based on previous literature on emotions in social movements and methods of emotion discourse analysis, this study aims to deliberate (1) the subversive feature when anger is directed to the structure and opponents and (2) anger misaligned with other emotions in that its subversive power is suppressed. The findings revealed that anger represents subversive power when feminists oppose the source of injustice and confront their opponents’ denigration without fear. However, frustration, grievance, and pain come to the forefront when anger is suppressed in affective relationships. Additionally, when feminists successfully cope with emotional conflicts and emphasize the empowering side of their anti-marriage stance, their feminist identities are reinforced.

Online feminist stand-up comedy: an emerging affective-discursive intervention on gender in China

ABSTRACT This article focuses on online women’s stand-up comedy in China and its intervention on gender-related and feminist issues. Acknowledging the role of affect in both stand-up comedy performance and the formation of feminist politics, we conduct an affective-discursive analysis of women’s stand-up performances from the popular Chinese online stand-up comedy show Rock & Roast (脱口秀大会). In the analysis, we explore how the female comedians discursively and physically express two affects – disgust and shame – in ways that reveal their bodily and affective awareness of everyday gender inequalities. We argue that these online performances create a digital affective space which allows everyday affects of Chinese women to be expressed, circulated, and shared. These stand-up performances are affective-discursive manifestations of female comedians’ self-authorship and self-empowerment in the contemporary context of Chinese digital feminisms.

THE EFFECT OF FEMINISM ON EGYPTIAN LITERATURE

This study examines the contemporary Egyptian female subculture movements that have brought life to the nation's media landscape. According to the study, women have created unique strategies for encouraging a shared discussion on the significance of social change. Their emphasis on lifestyle issues often reserved for closed-door private discussions enables them to question social norms without upsetting the government or security services and entering the polarised political environment. This article examines the objectives and internal workings of three distinct online feminist initiatives using case studies. Through semi-structured interviews with important participants, we were able to understand the evolution of these groups from networks to movements and ultimately into the organizations we are familiar with today.

‘Towards a Feminist Consciousness’: Digitalising Leadership

This article examines the ways in which transnational and queer feminisms could conceptualise (new) meanings of leadership that are grounded in collectivism. Through being in conversation with the co-founders/running members and collaborators of Towards a Feminist Consciousness, a Pan-African queer feminist online platform from Western Sahara, this paper attempts to interrogate how their leadership praxis challenges the conventional thinking of leadership. The article demonstrates that Towards a Feminist Consciousness’s collective leadership turns cyberspace into a powerful communication instrument to establish mutuality and solidarity networks -transcending the boundaries of the nation and gender. First, the paper emphasises how their leadership emerged to challenge their erasure through decentralising knowledge production, which is usually restricted to certain geographical locations. It further addresses how hierarchal power relations could be negotiated through participating in the decision-making processes, thus allowing the alternation of power and influence. Second, the article highlights that facilitating open dialogue could solidify feminist consciousness transcending boundaries. In doing so, collective leadership processes are established through expert and referent power. Expert power is exhibited through theorising their lived experiences under the Moroccan occupation, while referent power is rooted in establishing mutuality based on their shared purpose and aspirations. The article lastly draws on emotional leadership as an integral element when theorising Towards a Feminist Consciousness’s leadership praxis through the prism of political love as the way forward.

From Cinderella to i-woman: Web novels, fandom, and feminist politics in China

i-Woman is a new genre of female-oriented web novel that emerged in China after 2020. By intentionally reversing the Cinderella story pattern of the classic romance, the i-woman genre and its feminist fans challenge patriarchal discourse and explore a new feminist way of writing. More than just a fandom of a popular literature form, i-woman is also a feminist mobilization strategy in contemporary Chinese online feminist activism. A textual analysis of i-woman novels and a digital ethnography of its communities suggests that by incorporating separatist feminist ideologies into novels and trying to build solidarity in fandom communities, digital feminists are conducting feminist activism in the form of fantagonism. Building an ideal feminist solidarity is performed as an exclusion of certain types of novel genres and their readers. Operating feminism through fandom opens new online spaces for feminist activists while affecting and restricting its operation. This developing fandom form shows potential for fandom culture to turn into political participation and offers insights into how to operate digital feminism in contemporary China.

The political identity for Megalia, Womand and Webtoon to counter Confucianism culture in South Korea

Referring to the wave of digital feminism in the modern era, this paper formulates the problem of South Korea's digital feminism strategy in reconstructing Confucianism culture with respect to morality. The study aims to analyze the development of digital feminist activist morality in South Korea against the background of a Confucian society and rapid economic growth. Of the numerous online feminist activist groups, Megalia and Womand have garnered attention from several feminist scholars. Moreover, later Webtoon comic artists incorporated feminist ideologies into their comic narratives. Based on Andrew Heywood's cultural conflict and identity politics perspective, as well as political morality in realism, the author has identified two crucial findings. First, the three of them operate from a realistic perspective that excludes Confucian morality as a factor in their decision making. Second, Megalia and Womand tend to exhibit radical behavior due to their exclusive focus on identity politics. This contrasts with Webtoon, which creates comics driven by economic interests, resulting in more moderate behavior and a preference for cultural distribution.

Women Struggle for Workers' Rights in Radical and Moderate Feminist Media

Aims: This study sought to take a closer look at how a message and theme are presented by two online feminist alternative media considered to have distinct styles, namely Konde.co which is Radical and Magdalene.co which is Moderate, sincethe text in the news contains a powerful ability to influence the public’s views towards existing reality. 
 Study Design: This study used quantitative text analysis.
 Place and Duration of Study: 35 articles that are relevant to the topic were taken as research material, with a publication period between April 1, 2019 –May 31, 2023. This period was chosen due to the nuance of Labor Day where many working women voiced their aspirations at that moment
 Methodology: Content analysis is an important research method in social sciences and human sciences. This method has two key advantages. First, it accepts symbolic communications, which are relatively unstructured, as data. It means that content analysis can accept data in the form of text, images, or other symbols, even if they lack clear formal structures.
 Results: Text in the news is very effective in shaping public perceptions of existing reality. In the context of news, text functions as a representation of communication. Through words, sentences and writing styles, text in news can shape how readers perceive and judge reality. In addition, text as a symbol has the ability to convey meaning that seeps into people's feelings or emotions. The massive scale of developments in information technology makes it easier for people to access text in the news. It is also utilized by certain groups to disseminate information using their media. As a result, media have grown healthily in Indonesia.
 Conclusion: It is clear from this study that Konde.co and Magdalene.co, among others, fill the role of alternative media in voicing women's issues, especially working women. Konde.co is aggressively voicing the issue of female workers using radical language and diction. Magdalene.co, on the other hand, is consistent in pushing the belief that women deserve the same stability and career path as men.

Chinese Online Audiences Aesthetics Change on Female Characters in Media Products from 2018 to 2023

As time developed, online media also developed rapidly. Nowadays, online media had become the majority of media for the audience. As the outbreak in 2019, the closure policy was released. The closure policy severely restricted peoples access to public areas, including a large number of cinemas and offline multimedia venues. As a result, people had to increase their online media use to fill the gap in offline media entertainment, which gave online media a huge boost. The article shows the research on how Chinese online audience aesthetics on female characters in media products changed from 2018 to 2023, adopting participant observation methods for observation samples and content analysis methods for discussing observation results. The observation reflects that independent and powerful female images are more required by the audiences and more attention by the producers. In addition, this kind of change exist limitations. According to the analysis, the progress in womens social position, the outbreak, the closure policy, and the progress in thought and the historical legacy make up the macro factor of the change. In addition, online feminist activity, the audiences internal influence and the commercial effects also be related that have an impact on the change.

“White feminism ruins the party again”: a case study of the rise and fall of the My Favorite Murder Facebook fan group

ABSTRACT This paper employs digital ethnographic methods to explore the Facebook fan group for the popular podcast My Favorite Murder. We argue that the My Favorite Murder podcast and Facebook group, while providing a potentially unique feminist online space for its members in its early days, quickly devolved into a toxic space rife with conflict and ultimately destroyed by white-centred feminism and white supremacy. We explore failed gatekeeping practices in relation to other Facebook podcast fan groups that have met a similar demise. Finally, we question whether truly inclusive anti-racist feminist spaces can exist in capitalistic models of media production and consumption.

#girls help girls#: feminist discussions and affective heterotopia in patriarchal China

ABSTRACT In June 2021, a girl named Du Meizhu revealed on Weibo (Chinese Twitter) of having been emotionally and sexually abused by the top-tier idol Kris Wu. The incident gained publicity over the month and climaxed in mid-July, when netizens started the hashtag #girls help girls# on Weibo. Rapidly topping the trending list, this incident led to heated discussions around the case and women’s social status in contemporary Chinese patriarchy. Yet unlike its #MeToo counterpart, the hashtag had been taken down hastily within hours, cutting its practitioners off from further engagements. In this paper we nonetheless propose a more positive interpretation of the incident. Combining Massumi’s affect theory with Foucault’s heterotopia, we argue that Weibo users constructed themselves an affective heterotopia in the hashtag #girls help girls#. Through an affective textual analysis of the posts in the hashtag, we argue that while vulnerable to censorship, the affective force in this heterotopia is ultimately untameable to the discursive regime, potentially leading to concrete feminist ends. In so doing, we offer methodological insight for understanding online feminist discussions in the particular context of contemporary China, adding to scholarship that transcends the global North orientation in feminist theory and politics.

The significance of feminist infrastructure: #MeToo in the construction industry and the green industry in Sweden

AbstractTo better understand the interplay between digital activism and feminist infrastructure, this study investigates #MeToo activism in the Swedish construction industry and green industry. Both are industries in transition characterized by a dissonance between formal incentives, that encourage women and others to work in environments previously dominated by white men, and the informal power structures hosting a toxic masculinity. Based on media texts and interviews with key persons from the industries, the article situates #MeToo in a local context and shows how it was embedded in a supportive social, cultural, and technical infrastructure. In both industries, at the time of #MeToo this feminist infrastructure was already in place consisting of: an awareness of the problem of sexual harassment and abuse, knowledge of feminist explanatory models, established feminist online networks, and a supportive feminist culture, which together with widespread digital and feminist literacy became instrumental in the organization of the movement. Social media connected activists and created a critical mass by supporting the uniting of conflicting identity positions around shared differences. The established feminist infrastructure meant that the #MeToo activism, by articulating a widespread affective dissonance, pushed open doors that were already half open and forced them wide. This can explain some of the movement's success in Sweden.

'GASLIGHT, GATEKEEP, GIRLBOSS': MEMEFIED FEMININITIES AND DISIDENTIFICATION IN TIKTOK YOUTH CULTURES

Catchcries of empowerment and enterprise have been documented and critiqued by a range of scholars, and continue to be invoked within the postfeminist mainstream (Negra 2014, Winch 2013, Adkins and Dever 2016, Banet-Weiser 2015, Dobson 2014). Yet, on the social media platform TikTok, a number of alternative feminist trends have emerged. Young users are increasingly disidentifying with, or even zealously rejecting, postfeminist ideals. This emerging form of online feminist consciousness, however, intertwines with existing regimes of femininity and girlhood, producing a fraught environment within which establishing a young, feminine identity is particularly precarious. Expanding on scholarship examining teenage girlhood on TikTok (Kennedy 2020) and the ‘memeified’ politics of Gen Z (Zeng and Abidin 2021), we consider how young girls on TikTok have developed ‘remixed’ feminine identities by positioning figures such as the ‘girlboss’, the ‘pick me girl’ and ‘that girl’ as imagined others. Throughout our analysis, we highlight a range of tensions and contradictions that are evoked within normative frames of youthful femininity. These include performing ‘wokeness’ (Sobande 2019); compulsory irony (Chateau 2020); navigating digital literacies (Nissenbaum and Shifman 2017); manufacturing relatability (Kanai 2019) and compliance with hegemonic feminine norms. Ultimately, we argue that through practices of humour, irony and disidentification, the ‘girlboss’, the ‘pick me girl’ and 'that girl' are evoked as feminine Others, producing a collective feminist politics that lacks positive identity markers, where the feminine self must precariously navigate practices of identification, disidentification, opposition and rejection.