Introduction: global TV images of female masculinity in the 2010s

Abstract

This introductory article to the special Forum “Global TV Images of Female Masculinity in the 2010s” offers a reflection on the concept of “female masculinity” in global media and gender studies. Witnessing a growing number of TV representations of masculine girls and women worldwide, we present a summary of the four articles which comprise this themed Forum and address a number of key issues in their case studies, including televisual imaginaries of heterosexual, masculine women, the cultural legitimization of global female masculinities on reality TV, and the racialization and stigmatization of masculine women in White heteronormative societies. The Forum thus promotes a critical dialogue that aims to stimulate further interest in this interdisciplinary field by emphasizing the mutual implications of gendered TV genres and tropes, cross-cultural currents of gender, sexual, and racial knowledge and politics, and the intersectionality of female gender, sexuality, race, and nationality in TV representations.