Crossroads in Cultural Studies Conference 14-17th December 2016 Program Index

course “fitspiration” or “fitspo”. Fitspiration represents a combination of cultural texts with post-feminist
attitudes of “positive thinking” that encourage and inspire its members (all female) to become fit. Crucial
among this new wave of fitness representation is the gym selfie or sweaty selfie, smartphone photographs
the user takes of themselves in the context of a workout. Using discourse analysis and textual analysis, I
examine the context of the selfie and its popularity, and critique the gym selfie genre as a potentially
empowering but ultimately incorporating medium that offers women avenues of self-representation while
reinforcing emphasis on the body and traditional notions of femininity.
3Q
Gender, intimacy and the cult (ure) of confidence (Chair, Martha Michailidou)
This panel examines how confidence materializes in different sites and spaces centred on both public and private
intimacies. Located in an intersectional understanding, but foregrounding gender, the papers seek to explore new
constructions of intimacy and their entanglement with the contemporary cult(ure) of confidence. The panel brings
together scholars from Canada (Sarah Sharma), Greece (Martha Michailidou), and the UK (Rosalind Gill).
Sarah Sharma
Sexodus and Refusal: The problem with male disposability
This talk grapples with and locates the male fantasy of exit as it pervades the contemporary moment. Exit
lurks within the market, the technologies of the sharing economy, rightwing Men’s rights movements and
the leftist refusal of work. In terms of the Sexodus/MGTWO movement, popular media depicts a buffoon in a
basement masturbating and playing video games. A deeper look finds a misguided misogynist, but also an
articulate one – an educated male well versed in feminist theory with a programmatic plan to withhold
reproductive participation from women in a culture that now treats men like a disposable utility. But this
pervasive sense of male disposability gives me pause in that it is also a common theme within the precarity
politics coming out of the left and the refusal of work paradigm. At stake in both attempts at exit (whether
out of capitalism or feminism) is the uneven demand of reproducing the social order and the political
condition of indispensability tied to intimacy and care.
Martha Michailidou* & Rosalind Gill
Confidence is the new sexy
This paper is an attempt to analyse the materiality of the imperative to confidence, currently one of the
dominant problematisations of femininity in popular culture. To be self-confident seems to be the new
imperative of our time – at least for women. Beauty brands hire “confidence ambassadors”, women’s
magazines promote a “confidence revolution” (Cosmo) or dedicate special issues to the topic (e.g. “The
Confidence Issue: A smart woman’s guide to self-belief”, Elle 2015) and in the area of intimate relationships
confidence is presented as “the new sexy” – more important than how you look or what you can do. It adds
a psychological profile to earlier notions of intimate entrepreneurship. This paper documents the turn to
confidence and offers a brief genealogy of its development in popular culture, showing how it seeks to
remake intimate relationality.
3R
Colour, culture and contestation (Chair, Qian Gong)
Åsa Bartholdsson The normalizing power of red, yellow and green: the coloring of emotions and conduct in
small children’s popular culture and educational programmes
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