“A Gap Between Girl Power and Girlhood in the Classroom”
“According to Pomerantz and Raby, part of the reason girls find themselves reluctant to confront a boy who says “go make me a sandwich” can be attributed to the prevalence of post-feminist narratives in the media. This is where girl power narratives can go wrong: In portraying beautifully-empowered girls on television and sending the message that this status is easily attainable, the reality of sexism in Hollywood, the workforce and schools often goes ignored and dismissed.
These narratives, as University of London professor Rosalind Gill has concluded, give their audiences the sense that they live in a world that has already reached these ideals — in other words, a post-feminist one. As part of the pressure to conform to this unrealistic image of girlhood, girls find themselves either unable to recognize the existence of sexism in their lives or so afraid of losing hold of that ideal that they restrain themselves from appearing too smart or unattractive for popular femininity”
