“When I went back and looked at some of these shows that I loved, I noticed that the writer's room was all adult men with the exception of one or two episodes in Saved by the Bell's case. And I just thought, wow, it is so interesting that we talk about diversity and representation, like yes, of course, who's on the screen matters, but who's in the writer's room and who's telling the stories really matters too, because that's where stereotypes abound. Because those men were not writing Jesse Spano as an example of an actual feminist. She was written as a character from an adult male's response to like second wave feminist stereotypes. And they found that type of woman irritating, so they wrote Jessie as an irritating character. And it just was an interesting thing for me to explore the way I internalized themes from pop culture thinking about who was writing this and when did it contribute to a stereotype versus when did it communicate an authentic experience.”
So says Kate Kennedy, a brilliantly astute historian of millennial culture, which she explores, in depth in One in a Millenial: On Friendship, Feelings, Fangirls, and Fitting in, a bestselling book that’s part memoir, but really a love letter and a critique of the culture so many of us grew up in.
As part of my book tour I went on Kate’s podcast, Be There in Five, where I was immediately taken by her intelligence and deep, deep knowledge of the programming that shaped our consciousness, from Jessie Spano’s feminism in Saved by the Bell—and the laugh track it inspired—to the way so many women and girls were taught that our interests were dumb, shallow, and silly. Or, to use the parlance of the day: Basic. In One in a Millenial, Kennedy points to this long tradition of the veneration of action figures, Marvel, and football—and the deprecation of pretty much anything that girls and women value, whether it’s romance novels, the Spice Girls, or American Girl Dolls. While her point is not new—and certainly aligned with our summer of the Barbie movie, Taylor Swift, and Beyoncé—her exploration of how it shaped her own mind in childhood, and the way she experiences herself now as a result of it, is revelatory, and something we explore in today’s conversation.
MORE FROM KATE KENNEDY:
One in a Millenial: On Friendship, Feelings, Fangirls, and Fitting in
Be There in Five Podcast
Kate’s Website
Instagram: Follow Kate and Be there in Five
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Pulling The Thread with Elise Loehnen