Events
GRG Seminar: 'Consuming the Femme Fatale', Dr Katherine Farrimond
- Venue: Room G5, Percy Building, Newcastle University
- Start: Wed, 29 Nov 2017 16:30:00 GMT
- End: Wed, 29 Nov 2017 18:00:00 GMT
'Consuming the Femme Fatale: Glamour, Nostalgia and Feminism'
Dr Katherine Farrimond, University of Sussex
‘Femme fatale’, a term most often associated with classical film noir, can also be found in consumer contexts from fashion magazine editorials and beauty products to sex toys and weapons. Despite this elasticity, there are points of gravity and attraction around which the term hovers in consumer culture: aspiration, agency, glamour, danger. In this paper, Dr Farrimond examines instances of ‘femme fatale’ in consumer culture as indicative of the elasticity of retro culture, the uses to which certain nostalgic figurations can be put, and the relationship between (post)feminism and the past.
Biography
Katherine Farrimond is Lecturer in Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Sussex. Her monograph, The Contemporary Femme Fatale was published with Routledge in 2017, and she has published numerous articles and book chapters on representations of girlhood, femininity, sexuality and the uses of the past in popular culture. She is book reviews editor for Feminist Theory Journal and co-editor of SEQUENCE.