The risky business of postfeminist beauty

Dosekun, Simidele ORCID: 0009-0005-6908-6863 (2017) The risky business of postfeminist beauty. In: Elias, Ana Sofia, Gill, Rosalind and Scharff, Christina, (eds.) Aesthetic Labour: Rethinking Beauty Politics in Neoliberalism. Dynamics of Virtual Work. Palgrave Macmillan, London, UK, 167 - 181. ISBN 9781137477644

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Abstract

This chapter explores the risks involved in women’s beauty practice under conditions of neoliberal postfeminism, drawing on a research project on young Nigerian women who fashion themselves in ‘spectacularly feminine style.’ It argues that with the postfeminist intensification of beauty norms, attended by the commodified proliferation of beauty technologies, the pursuit of beauty comes to pose heightened embodied and psychic risks for women. The chapter explores the research participants’ constructions of their ‘choice’ to take on such risk and their strategies to manage and mitigate it. It proposes the new theoretical concepts of ‘aesthetic vigilance’ and ‘aesthetic rest’ as entrepreneurial practices of risk-managing one’s attachments to beauty and its technologies so as to better maintain rather than resist them.

Item Type:	Book Section
Official URL:	https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9781137477644
Additional Information:	© 2017 The Author
Divisions:	Media and Communications
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD61 Risk Management H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BH Aesthetics
Date Deposited:	30 Sep 2019 14:24
Last Modified:	11 Dec 2024 18:00
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/101782

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