Critical Femininities

This paper seeks to develop a theory of subversive femininities or femme theory. It argues for the inclusion of femmephobia in intersectional analyses and provides the theoretical groundwork necessary for feminist theorists and researchers to incorporate an analysis of femmephobia into their studies of oppression.

Since the 1970s social science researchers have documented the cultural devaluation of femininity and its impact on experiences of discrimination among sexual and gender minorities. Yet, despite the continued and accumulating evidence demonstrating the role of anti-femininity (or femmephobia) in these experiences, little research has specifically examined femininity as an intersecting component of discrimination. Using in-depth interviews with sexual and gender minorities (N = 38), the current study explores the intersecting role of femmephobia in experiences of discrimination. Under the global theme of “femininity as target,” 5 key subthemes were identified: femininity and passing, regulating sexualities, masculine right of access, biological determinism, and the feminine joke. Participants illuminated femmephobia as a regulatory power within LGBTQ+ communities and society at large, as well as how femininity itself operates as a target in their experiences of gender policing and discrimination. By turning attention toward femininity, the current paper provides a clearer understanding of what may possibly lay at the heart of many social issues surrounding discrimination and violence. These findings have implications for the study of social inequalities, as well as strategies for remedying the pervasive devaluation of femininity.

Using femme theory, Foucault, and queer failure as analytical frameworks, the current paper demonstrates the role of feminine failure in resisting and subverting systems of oppression, subsequently providing the minute shifts in power necessary to expand the terms of patriarchal femininity. More specifically, the current paper draws on contemporary modes of art and aesthetics to examine the productive potential of failing to embody patriarchal femininity, positing this failure as a form of femme resistance. By hijacking cultural signifiers of adornment, femme and feminine failure celebrate that which is culturally shamed (queer, fat, disabled, variant, poor, and racially minoritised bodies), expose systems of erasure, challenge binary systems of meaning, and promote feminine growth. Examining each of these themes in turn, the current paper argues that feminine failure challenges the pillars of patriarchal femininity and discursive systems of normativity. To this end, femme as a theoretical framework demonstrates the freedom of failure by exposing the heterogeneous multiplicities of femininity, and offering possibilities that normativity never could. This critical discursive essay contributes to the emergent application of femme as a theoretical framework.

Narrative-works are the lifeblood of femme scholarship. Through this medium, femmes write themselves into existence. In this article, I begin with my own story of femme and examine the backdrop of patriarchal femininity that positions pieces of me as being at odds, disjointed, and something needing to be reconciled. Indeed, many current frameworks and dominant framings for understanding femininity create disjunctures needing to be reconciled and fail to include diverse feminine perspectives in ways that constitute epistemic and hermeneutical injustices. Using my own femme becoming as a guide, I offer this process of femme reconcilement as a framework that can be applied to dislodge feminine normativity and challenge the assumptions researchers make about femininity within their work. In this article I highlight the importance of femme epistemologies; the importance of valuing feminine knowledge, and how the absented femme highlights the continued god-trick of objectivity. Here, I discuss how femme narratives can be used to bolster femme as theory and critical analytic. This situated knowledge holds the possibility to inform novel methodological frameworks and to substantially shift the way researchers think about femininity and feminine people.

The devaluing of femininity is a social problem with serious consequences. Violence against women, men, transgender people, and racial minorities is often exacerbated when elements of femmephobia are present. Femmephobia refers to the devaluation and regulation of femininity and suggests a separate, perhaps overlapping, phenomenon specific to gender (e.g., femininity), rather than gender/sex (e.g., woman) or sex (e.g., female). Yet, despite growing evidence warranting the consideration of femmephobia, little research has considered femininity as an intersectional axis. Femmephobia has been examined in a fractured manner, isolating its various manifestations in specific, rather than overarching ways. The current paper explored how these systems are interrelated and argues that sources of oppression underlying many forms of violence today (e.g., anti-LGBTQ+ hate crimes, Incel attacks, sexual violence, transgender murders) are all symptoms of the same underlying social prejudice: femmephobia. While sexism, transphobia, homophobia, and racism also play a role, previous research tends to overlook or conflate the role of femmephobia in fueling prejudice and violence. Using in-depth interviews and thematic analysis, the current paper explored the intersecting role of femmephobia in experiences of oppression among sexual and gender minorities (N = 38). Two thematic networks are presented. The first network pertains to masculine themes: masculine privilege, masculinity as protective, and masculinity as the norm. The second network pertains to femininity: feminine inferiority, femininity as target, and femininity as inauthentic. The connection between these two thematic networks illustrates the symbiotic relationship between femmephobia and the gender binary. Finally, patterns identified from the thematic analysis were used to generate a model of femmephobia. This paper suggests that the gender binary is not merely a division; it is also hierarchical and regulated by femmephobia.

Is being more religious a protective factor when it comes to eating disorders, or a risk factor? Past research has provided conflicting answers to this question, and thus, the purpose of the present study was to determine whether the variable association between religiosity and eating disorders can be explained through the mediating variable of views of femininity. Using a sample of 231 individuals, the current study demonstrated that the ways in which individuals view their femininity mediates the association between religiosity and disordered eating. More religious individuals were more likely to hold an essentialized (unexplored or unexamined) view of their own femininity, and this view was associated with an increased risk of disordered eating. However, more religious individuals were also less likely to feel excluded by others on the basis of how they enact their femininity, and that view was associated with a decreased risk of disordered eating. These two indirect effects effectively canceled each other out, leaving no significant overall association between religiosity and eating disorders. Future researchers are encouraged to explore further applications of considering femininity as a multifaceted concept when studying both religion and eating disorders.

This PhD thesis contributes to sociological understandings of how femininities are understood and experienced by Australian heterosexual women, and develops language for conceptualising the hierarchies within femininities, and femininities and masculinities. Furthermore, through analysis of gender maneuvering this research provides insight into the intricacies of the relationship between structure and agency in expressing one’s gender. Motivated by a lack theoretical works on multiple femininities, this thesis uses focus groups with different communities of practice to understand how female gender expressions are constructed hierarchically, and to examine the complexities around embodying various forms of femininities.

Understanding how men express ‘being a man’ and their masculinity has been of considerable interest in sociology in recent years. However, female gender expressions have received less attention, and much of the work that has occurred within this field has examined the experiences of queer women, leaving heterosexual gender expressions a relatively under explored area. I argue that dominant female gender expressions can be understood as being constructed through three key dimensions of femininity: the physical (body), the malleable (appearance) and the restrictive (demeanour). Non-dominant and pariah femininities manifest when these dimensions are violated in some way, attracting stigma and significant social penalties. By focussing on how my participants collectively group together and rank particular forms of female gender expression, a hierarchy through which to analyse femininities is proposed.. Within this, the intragender relations between female gender expressions highlights not only the relationality between the feminine and masculine, but also between the feminine and unfeminine. Through examination of the multiplicities of femininities and their relationships, I demonstrate how the lack of linguistic alternatives for heterosexual female gender expressions results in a reinforcement of binary constructions of gender that maintains not only a position of subordination to men, but also privileges femininities that maintain this relationality.


I explore the ways that women find spaces where they are able to challenge dominant ideals of female gender expressions and reconstruct femininity on their own terms. Relations within particular communities of practice demonstrate that violations of the dimensions of femininity do not always attract the same stigma but instead can enable alternative gender relations to develop through gender manoeuvring. However, once out of these spaces, pressures to embody feminine characteristics are felt throughout women’s lives, exacerbated by dating, relationships, co-habitation and child rearing.

This special issue of Fat Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Body Weight and Society explores fatness in relation to femininity. The relationship between fatness and femininity is longstanding and fraught: fatness can be feminizing, and fat flesh is often feminized, while fatness is simultaneously a “failure” of feminine norms (Hoskin & Taylor, 2019). For example, existing scholarship on fat femininities, especially in the areas of feminist theory and fat studies, demonstrates how fat femininities are marginalized via their deviations from normative feminine ideals, particularly slenderness. The goal of this special issue is to build on this literature by centering critical analyses of the relationships between fatness and femininity, especially how these relationships are mediated by sexuality, race, class, disability, age, gender identity, and other axes of identity. This special issue will prioritize submissions that use a critical femininities lens, which challenges femininity’s associations with superficiality and oppression and, instead, centers intersectional and recuperative approaches to femininity.  It is our goal that this issue will illuminate: the complex relationships between femininity and fatness; how these relationships differ across intersectional axes; and the ways in which femininity and fatness intertwine to create unique experiences of gendered embodiment and being.  For full details visit ashleyhoskin.ca/fat-femininities

Women’s gender expressions are still an under researched area, and heterosexual women’s gender expressions have received even less attention. My research investigates the different ways in which heterosexual women express their gender. Five focus groups were conducted with women from various communities of practice. This paper presents part of my findings about non-dominant gender expressions for cis heterosexual women. I argue that dominant women’s gender expressions can be understood as being constructed through three key dimensions of femininity: the physical (body), the malleable (appearance) and the restrictive (demeanour). Non-dominant and pariah femininities manifest when these dimensions are violated in some way, attracting stigma and significant social penalties. By focussing on how my participants collectively group together and rank particular forms of women’s gender expression, a hierarchy through which to analyse femininities is proposed. Within this, the intragender relations between women’s gender expressions highlights not only the relationality between the feminine and masculine, but also between the feminine and unfeminine. These findings have implications for theorising gender relations, both between genders and within them.

Is being more religious a protective factor when it comes to eating disorders, or a risk factor? Past research has provided conflicting answers to this question, and thus, the purpose of the present study was to determine whether the variable association between religiosity and eating disorders can be explained through the mediating variable of views of femininity. Using a sample of 231 individuals, the current study demonstrated that the ways in which individuals view their femininity mediates the association between religiosity and disordered eating. More religious individuals were more likely to hold an essentialized (unexplored or unexamined) view of their own femininity, and this view was associated with an increased risk of disordered eating. However, more religious individuals were also less likely to feel excluded by others on the basis of how they enact their femininity, and that view was associated with a decreased risk of disordered eating. These two indirect effects effectively canceled each other out, leaving no significant overall association between religiosity and eating disorders. Future researchers are encouraged to explore further applications of considering femininity as a multifaceted concept when studying both religion and eating disorders.