Gender Inversion of the Smurfette Principle ‘Eight Girls and One Me – Wherever They Go, I Go!’: How Many Girls Are Enough to Overpower One Boy?

Abstract

ABSTRACT A trope depicting a sole girl among many boys is widely known as the Smurfette principle. It is often used with the aim to emphasize the high-priority of male personages and the low-priority of the female ones. The only girl is stereotypical here, whereas all the boys are shown as individuals. Even more, this woman among the men is perceived as an appendage. But what will happen if we turn over this trope? Suppose if it is only one boy surrounded by many girls, what would that look like? Who would be a leader in such a company? Would it still be a boy (because men are stronger, anyway)? Or, after all, would it be girls (as women are in the majority here)? If the last variant, how many girls are enough to overpower one boy? Actually, there are some genres (such as Ukrainian epigraphic embroidery) where gender inversion of the Smurfette principle called after the folklore phrase ‘Eight Girls and One Me – Wherever They Go, I Go!’ is more popular than the Smurfette principle itself. For more than one century, it has been moved from folk to popular and professional cultures and returned to its roots, naturally being transformed in line with changing realities.