This master thesis is discussing ten pony books from 2006 in relation to the heterosexual matrix. It contains a rather extensive research overview regarding horse riding from a gender perspective, pony books, traditional feminist studies of girls’ books and queer readings of girls’ and children’s literature. The aim of the empirical study is two folded; firstly to show how the girl protagonists’ horse riding is presented in terms of masculinity and femininity (as defined by Natalie Koivula), secondly to analyze the relations between the girls appearing in the books from a queer perspective attempting to find some queer leakage in the depictions. The theory applied is based on Judith Butler and the method is derived from the tradition of queer readings and feminist counter readings. The results show that the protagonists construct masculinity as well as femininity, often combined, which question the assumption that girls and women can only construct femininity and furthermore illustrate that the division between femininity and masculinity is not as natural as is often assumed. The analysis also demonstrates that some of the girls express intense emotions for other girls and show a stronger bond towards other girls than towards boys. However, the relations between the girls are often normalized in accordance with the heterosexual matrix. The conclusion of the thesis is that the pony books can be both liberating from current heterosexual gender norms and reinforcing this societal order. Another important conclusion is that the liberating potential varies greatly between the books. / Uppsatsnivå: D
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hb-18534 |
| Date | January 2007 |
| Creators | Stockstad, Moa |
| Publisher | Högskolan i Borås, Institutionen Biblioteks- och informationsvetenskap / Bibliotekshögskolan, University of Borås/Swedish School of Library and Information Science (SSLIS) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | Magisteruppsats i biblioteks- och informationsvetenskap vid institutionen Biblioteks- och informationsvetenskap, 1654-0247 ; 2007:75 |
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