The Cultural politics of Meghan Markle
Symposium
15th November 2019, Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1R 4RL
We are proud to announce 14 scholars from different disciplines and countries around the globe, coming together to examine the cultural politics of Meghan Markle. They will share their forthcoming work from two special issues on Markle edited by Dr Hannah Yelin and Dr Laura Clancy: ‘Disciplining the M/Other: examining contemporary mediated motherhood through the case of Meghan Markle’, for Women’s Studies in Communication and ‘Race, Royalty and the Cultural Politics of Meghan Markle: Elites, Inequalities and a Woman in the Public Eye’ for Women’s Studies International Forum. Their work takes a range of approaches to the topic including cultural history, black studies, critical race studies, Maori studies, sociological, Americanist, women’s and gender studies, film and media, education, digital media, and marketing and advertising.
Papers will respond to Markle's construction in the media and the popular imagination in relation to conceptions of pregnancy and motherhood, intersections of gender, race, age, and class, public performances of femininity and the scrutiny these receive, the discussions she has provoked around gender and race, her position as an American actor who has married into the British Royal Family, and the questions these raise around nationality identity, (cultural) capital, celebrity, (post)colonialism, politics and power. Each paper takes a different perspective to the cultural and representational politics that surround these public media events and the neoliberal, commodified, sexist, racist, ageist rhetorics that circulate within them. Markle as a public figure is a rich site through which to examine the gender, racial and class politics of structures such as celebrity, royalty and matrimony.
Schedule (may be subject to change)
‘Monarchy is a Feminist Issue’, Dr Laura Clancy, Lancaster University, Dr Hannah Yelin, Oxford Brookes University
‘An “Unsuitable Mother” and “Colourful Princess”? The Use of Motherhood to Discipline Meghan Markle’, Dr Jon Ward, University of East Anglia
‘“How any woman does what they do is beyond comprehension”: Meghan Markle and the masking of maternal labours’, Prof. Shani Orgad, London School of Economics, Prof. Kathryn Baldwin, Tulane University
‘A Question of Contrast: Unpacking the Mail Online’s Depiction of Meghan Markle’s Motherhood’, Mary McGill, University of Ireland, Galway
‘Pregnancy Age Shaming: Fertility and the Royal Pregnancy’, Dr Rebecca Feasey, Bath Spa University
‘‘A New Wrinkle’: Age, Race and Writing Meghan Markle’, Dr Rachael McLennan, University of East Anglia
‘Meghan, the Monarchy and Multiculturalism (Re)Mixed’, Dr Francesca Sobande, Cardiff University
‘Meghan Markle’s Courtship of a Colonised Commonwealth. Connecting with Aotearoa/ New Zealand’, Dr Helene Connor, University of Auckland
‘I like my baby heir with baby hair and afros": Meghan Markle, Beyoncé, Tiana and the womanist poetics of Black majesty’, Dr Nicole Willson, University of Central Lancashire
‘‘It’s All About the Poise’: Meghan Markle, Doria Raglan, and Black Motherhoods’. Prof. Fiona Handyside, Exeter University
‘Curvy, Fit, Skinny or Pregnant: Meghan Markle’s Body in the Media’, Tessa Nunn, Duke University
Editor’s closing remarks and paper ‘‘The best thing about Meghan Markle is she’s got a bit of black in her’: Girls making meaning around Meghan Markle’, Dr Hannah Yelin, Oxford Brookes University
Organisers
