A lecture by Dr Diane Purkiss, Keble College Oxford
Tuesday 19 January at 6pm
Sumpner Lecture Theatre
Bella Swan. Becky Bloomwood. Female protagonists so incompetent that they can’t walk down a hall without falling over. Emma and Liv, so obsessed with the wedding they seem not to notice the groom. Beth, Janine… man is the prize. The wife in 2012, still just a wife who can’t save the children, let alone the world.
What’s happened to women in movies intended to entertain?
If we compare these hopeless cases with the characters played by Katherine Hepburn and Roz Russell in the 1930s, we could almost form the opinion that we’re going backwards, fast. How did we swap Buff for Bella, and Susan for Becky? And is it coincidence that these films have been ejected nto the market in a moment when women’s climb into the higher echelons of business and the professions has slowed, halted, or gone into reverse?
This lecture is given by Dr Diane Purkiss who is a Fellow, Tutor and University Lecturer in English at Keble College Oxford.
Book a place for this free event.
This event is part of Aston's Year of Gender, Progress and Power.
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