College
College of Arts and Sciences
Major
Communication and Media
Faculty Mentor
Julie Holmchick Crowe, PhD
Faculty Editor
Julie Holmchick Crowe, PhD
Student Editor
Falen Wilkes
Abstract
Since its release in 2004, Mean Girls, which depicts high school life in the early 2000s, still reigns as the premier cult classic film of the era. Through critical rhetorical analysis of the film, this research explores the different types of “Mean Girls” presented in the film and how they each use specific voices to obtain their goals. Looking closely at three archetypes: the “Queen Bee,” the “Rebellious Goth,” and the “New Girl,” the results found that all three women used particular voices and personas to increase their social standing or to exact revenge — thus disempowering other women. This portrayal of teenage girls presents a problematic form of feminism that consists of cacophonous fighting and competition against each other in a way that goes against the overall interests of women.
Recommended Citation
Kaplan, Anna
(2019)
"'Stop Trying to Make Fetch Happen’: The Disempowerment of Women’s Voices in the Film Mean Girls.,"
SUURJ: Seattle University Undergraduate Research Journal: Vol. 3, Article 16.
Available at:
https://scholarworks.seattleu.edu/suurj/vol3/iss1/16