Suburban Icons/Communist Pasts  

Oleh:

Cole, CL

Jenis: Article from Journal - e-Journal
Dalam koleksi: Journal of Sport and Social Issues vol. 26 no. 3 (Aug. 2002), page 231-234.
Fulltext: 231.pdf (67.2KB)

Isi artikel

As the myth goes—into every generation a slayer is born. This season, fans of the fictional Sunnydale’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a campy narrative of good versus evil, were treated to a McDonald’s advertisement that traded on its (McDonald’s) sponsorship of the first girls’ All American High School (AAHS) Basketball Game. Notably, the inaugural game was played as part of the 25thth anniversary of the boys’ AAHS Game. During a break from the “chosen one”, but in yet another suburban space, a young girl clutching a doll marvels at the good fortune that follows from her older sister’s basketball skills. Not only does big sister score a McDonald’ssponsored trip to the Big Apple, but she has access to as many burgers as she can eat—and all because she plays basketball. Little sister, desiring the same, tosses her doll aside and picks up the Mcbasketball. The year is 2002, and the visual of girls trading in their dolls,now almost 40 years old, still signals the revolution. During the break from the sponsors, our stereotypical all-American girl, Buffy, defeats fantastic demons with her stunning and unmatched physical skills. Both figures of revolution—the new extreme sport figure, Buffy, and the girl basketball player—are inextricably linked to narratives of progress: Title IX, girl power, and American democracy. The powerful girl figure is an American post-cold war icon. But her bodily habitus is born out of an earlier performance of U.S. democracy over and against an imagined, gender-deviant Soviet athlete.

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