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http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/8841
Title: | From toothpick legs to dropping vaginas: Gender and sexuality in Joan Rivers' stand-up comedy performance |
Authors: | Lockyer, S |
Keywords: | Gender;Sexuality;Stand-up comedy;Joan Rivers;Self-deprecation;Ageing female body;Masculine discourses |
Issue Date: | 2011 |
Publisher: | Intellect |
Citation: | Comedy Studies, 2(2), 113 - 123, 2011 |
Abstract: | This article employs sociocultural analysis to examine Joan Rivers’ stand-up comedy performances in order to reveal how she successfully operates in a sphere of artistic expression that has been, and continues to be, male-dominated. The analysis uncovers how Rivers’ stand-up comedy performance involves a complex combination of elements and how it fuses features that are regarded as ‘traditionally masculine’, such as aggression, with features frequently used by other female stand-up comedians, such as self-deprecating comedy and confessional comedy. Furthermore, the analysis exposes the complex ways in which constructions of gender and sexuality are negotiated and re-negotiated in Rivers’ stand-up comedy performance, and illustrates how dominant ideological identity constructions can be simultaneously reinforced and subverted within the same comic moment. |
Description: | This is the author's accepted manuscript. The final published article is available from the link below. Copyright @ 2011 Intellect. |
URI: | http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/cost/2011/00000002/00000002/art00003 http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/8841 |
DOI: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1386/cost.2.2.113_1 |
ISSN: | 2040-610X |
Appears in Collections: | Sociology Dept of Social and Political Sciences Research Papers |
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