Handbook on Gender and Digital Media (International Handbooks on Gender series)

Handbook on Gender and Digital Media (International Handbooks on Gender series)

This timely Handbook explores the intersection between gender and digital media, examining how virtual platforms both challenge and reinforce traditional gender norms and inequalities. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, it reflects on key issues such as gendered digital labor, self-expression and intersectionality in cyberspaces. Leading and emerging international scholars discuss how gender identities are portrayed in virtual environments, addressing issues of stereotyping and visibility for marginalized groups. They demonstrate how digital platforms have become crucial tools for gender and LGBTQIA+ activism and investigate how feminist theories critique and reshape virtual infrastructures. Chapters delve into detailed case studies including Christian lifestyle creators and their influence on women; affective masculinity in video games; the normalization of misogyny within the manosphere; and how Afghan women's rights activists use digital technologies for community building. The Handbook ultimately advocates for greater critical engagement and activism regarding the role of digital media in shaping perceptions of gender and power. Students and scholars of family and gender, media studies, digital sociology and communication will greatly benefit from this expansive Handbook. It is also a crucial resource for activists involved in digital advocacy and feminist movements, as well as practitioners, professionals and policymakers in technology, media and digital industries. ‘Harp, Bachmann, and Loke have created a unique volume that reflects both the global and individual diversity of women’s experiences in today’s pervasive digital spaces. The Handbook encompasses a variety of theoretical approaches and research methods, illustrating the ongoing reproduction of inequalities and women’s resistance to these practices.’ -- Margaretha Geertsema-Sligh, Butler University, USA ‘Acknowledging the realities of the systems of power at work in both gender as a social construction and digital mediascapes, this volume explores and expands the territory of feminist media studies in its inclusive, transnational, multimethodological and theoretically eclectic scope. Perhaps most important is the reader’s focus on transformative progressive change and feminist activism through praxis. The contributors include a global pantheon of established and emerging voices in this growing subdiscipline. The book makes a timely and important contribution to both feminist media studies and feminist science and technology studies.’ -- Meenakshi Gigi Durham, University of Iowa, USA ‘This smart feminist trio has commissioned a rich set of chapters that taken together offer a comprehensive account of the gendered complexities at the heart of contemporary digital media, including their globalizing tendencies and local variations, the way they undermine but also strengthen community, resistance, and activism. These provocative explorations reject simplistic binaries and underscore relevant tensions and contradictions.’ -- Linda Steiner, University of Maryland, USA Edited by Dustin Harp, Department of Communication, The University of Texas at Arlington, USA, Ingrid Bachmann, School of Communications, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Chile and Jaime Loke, Bob Schieffer College of Communication, Texas Christian University, USA