“Honestly, Anywhere that I Have Wi-Fi”

A Posthuman Approach to Young Women's Activist Blogging

in Girlhood Studies
Author:
Lindsay C. Sheppard PhD Student, York University, Canada lshepp@yorku.ca

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https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3109-3484
and
Rebecca Raby Brock University, Canada rraby@ brocku.ca

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https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7830-2960
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3167/ghs.2022.150205
Keywords:
agency; Karen Barad; materialities; online activism; social media influencers; subjectivities; youth
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Abstract

We add to the scholarship on young women's online activism using a Baradian framework to explore the material-discursive contexts that co-create the meanings and possibilities of their activism. Through a diffractive methodology, we delve into key moments from blogs and interviews with bloggers to discuss two emerging themes. First, we offer an understanding of activist girl blogger subjectivities as intra-actively embedded and remade in material-discursive contexts of girlhood, artist, and celebrity in a neoliberal digital culture that valorizes social media influencers. Second, we examine the related entanglements of discourses-materialities-time-space-bodies, and the human and non-human agencies that co-constitute young women's activist blogging. Overall, we illustrate the potential of a Baradian approach for understanding the human and more-than-human complexities of young women's activist blogging and activist subjectivities.

Contributor Notes

Lindsay C. Sheppard (ORCID: 0000-0003-3109-3484) is a PhD student in the Department of Sociology at York University, Canada. She explores intersections of girlhood and activism in on/offline spaces, art activism, agency, and young people's participation. Email: lshepp@yorku.ca

Rebecca Raby (ORCID: 0000-0002-7830-2960) is a sociologist in the Department of Child and Youth Studies, Brock University, Canada. She studies constructions of childhood and youth, intersecting inequalities in young lives, and theories of participation and agency. Email: rraby@brocku.ca

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Girlhood Studies

An Interdisciplinary Journal

Cover Girlhood Studies
Article Category:
Research Article
Page Count:
18
Keywords:
agency; Karen Barad; materialities; online activism; social media influencers; subjectivities; youth
Print Publication Date:
01 Jun 2022
Online Publication Date:
01 Jun 2022
Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2022

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