Fantasy Girls: Gender in the New Universe of Science Fiction and Fantasy Television

“In this imaginative volume, Fantasy Girls boldly maps the emergent gender terrains characterizing new fantasy and science fiction TV. Combining close textual with rigorous theoretical analysis, this volume is the new feminist media studies at its best. It will be indispensable for teachers and scholars searching for the most up-to-date treatments of gender and television, including issues of sexuality, race, ethnicity, and the body. Fantasy Girls addresses head-on the tough issues facing feminists and others concerned with television and its impact.” ―Andrea L. Press, University of Virginia

“The essays collected in Fantasy Girls look to some of the most popular and innovative television programming of the late twentieth century to see how issues of gender are represented and imagined in the future. At their most compelling, the essays expose the operations in popular television that sometimes actively mute and at other times only selectively incorporate the force of feminist insights, particularly as these insights are quietly incorporated into the fantasy representations of gender and gender politics within science fiction. At their most critical, they indicate the powerful role of television in keeping us tethered to the categories and assumptions of the past even as we imagine the future.” ―Herman Gray, author of Watching Race: Television and the Struggle for ‘Blackness’

“The essays are consistent in quality and approach, and . . . yield astute if not necessarily novel or groundbreaking readings of the various programs.” ―Choice Reviews

“Fascinating and very readable critical anthology.” ―The Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts

“Regardless of why you are interested in this media phenomenon,Fantasy Girls is a must-read.” ―Review of Communication

“Covering television shows as diverse as Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, to The X-Files, to Xena, Warrior Princess and Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, the essays in this collection offer a thought-provoking exploration of gender roles in today’s science fiction and fantasy television programming. Anyone interested in women’s changing roles in the popular media should find something of interest in this stimulating anthology.” ―Sherrie A. Inness, Professor of English, Miami University

MARLEEN S BARR is known for her pioneering work in feminist science fiction and teaches in the Department of Communication and Media Studies at Fordham University. She has won the Science Fiction Research Association Pilgrim Award for lifetime achievement in science fiction criticism. Barr is the author of Alien to Feminity: Speculative Fiction and Feminist Theory, Lost in Space: Probing Feminist Science Fiction and Beyond, Feminist Fabulation: Space/Postmodern Fiction and Genre Fission: A New Discouse Practice for Cultural Studies. Barr has edited many anthologies and co-edited the special science fiction issue of PMLA.