While there have been countless third wave feminist texts published in recent years, none have focused so explicitly on television – a cultural medium that continues to spark debate amongst feminist critics everywhere. In this collection of essays (edited by Merri Lisa Johnson and inspired by a fall 2004 special issue of Scholar and Feminist Online, “Feminist Television Studies: The Case of HBO”[1]) the authors enter this ongoing debate by carving out a space for ‘third wavers’ to reconsider the cultural politics of television in the 21st century. Offering up a broad range of television programs for analysis, these well written articles draw from a number of theoretical perspectives and tackle such issues as gender, sex, and sexuality as they are played out on the small screen.

As Johnson outlines in the introduction, Third Wave Feminism and Television is inspired by the desire to see feminist TV criticism move beyond repetitive textual analyses which, more often than not, come to the same tired conclusions. Rather than relying on the “by-now formulaic feminist analyses” (14), which reduce media to a “pleasure/danger” binary, Johnson prefers analyses marked by “discontinuity.” For her, that “is precisely the point of third wave feminist media theory: the pleasure and danger of women’s relationships to television have yet to be reconciled” (22). Indeed, the specter of feminist film theory (particularly Laura Mulvey’s foundational work on the male gaze[2]) still haunts most forms of feminist TV criticism, often resulting in an interpretive strategy marked by the pessimistic view that television upholds patriarchal ideology. Yet, as Johnson rightly points out, this doesn’t explain why women (such as herself) keep on watching TV.

Comprised of seven essays in total, each chapter offers a refreshing and unique insight into many popular American television programs and provides some clues as to why we keep turning on the tube. Three chapters are dedicated specifically to HBO’s alternative dramatic series, such as Johnson’s interrogation of ‘gangster feminism’ in The Sopranos, Leslie Heywood’s exploration of the ‘heterosexual closet’ in Six Feet Under, and Laura Stemple’s highly informative discussion of the controversial prison program, Oz. Bobby Jean Noble and Katherine Frank take on reality TV with their analyses of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and The Bachelor, respectively. Rounding out these readings is Candace Moore’s intriguing analysis of The L Word’s ‘heteroflexibility,’ and Carol Siegel’s comparative piece, in which she tackles the issue of female sadomasochism as (mis)represented on Buffy the Vampire Slayer (unlike the “Anita Blake Vampire Hunter” novel series).

By the end of Third Wave Feminism and Television I found there to be three main areas addressed in the book which clearly separate it from earlier feminist TV criticisms, helping to define the beginnings of a ‘third wave’ approach to media. First, each author has contributed to a more flexible, negotiated style of interpreting television programs, thereby countering the textual determinism which often permeates second wave criticism. Here, critics resist the temptation to impose theory onto the text (i.e., reducing all TV to receptacles for patriarchal ideology), a symptom of the ‘formulaic analyses’ Johnson writes about in the introduction. Instead, they opt for an approach that uses the TV text as a starting point for discussions of contemporary sexual politics. Next, woven throughout many of the readings, are the authors’ attempts to grapple with their ‘aca-fan’ status, a term dubbed by famed media critic Henry Jenkins to acknowledge the intimate relationships many scholars have with popular culture. Integral to the development of a third wave feminist media criticism then, the feminist ‘aca-fan’ must be unapologetic and forthright in his/her involvement with (and consumption of) television. By fleshing out our own ‘consuming passions’ we also make room for thinking about why we continue to watch (as Johnson queries in the introduction) rather than simply dismissing or castigating those who do watch ‘politically incorrect’ TV. Finally, this collection's very attempt at delineating a third wave feminist approach to media expands the borders of ‘feminist TV criticism’ to include discussions of masculinity and male sexuality, transsexuality, and the contested notion of queer heterosexuality. This multi-dimensional perspective helps to broaden our critical lens, encouraging a type of feminist media criticism which moves beyond analyses that focus primarily on women and femininity. Certainly one of the larger projects of third wave feminist politics has been to openly embrace and explore all aspects of sex, gender, and sexuality as they intersect with other social identities and structures, thus complicating these categories in a way that redefines feminist sexual politics to reflect human diversity.

Third Wave Feminism and Television is a very accessible and engaging book that will make a great addition to any feminist classroom or personal library. With a broad range of topics and programs covered, this volume of the Reading Contemporary Television series is a must have for any student, teacher, or feminist media researcher who is interested in the sexual politics of contemporary TV programming.