#TextsfromHillary

From Grumpy Cat to Kim Kardashian’s latest #breaktheinternet photo shoot, the American public seems enamored with the next big meme. April 2012 gave us “Texts from Hillary,” a photo of then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton texting on her Blackberry with overlaid, fictitious captions. The Tumblr “Texts from Hillary” evolved from a conversation at a bar between friends (and public relations professionals), Adam Smith and Stacy Lambe to an internet sensation in less than seven days. In “Texts from Hillary: Meta-meming and Postfeminist Political Culture,” Karrin Vasby Anderson and Kristina Horn Sheeler analyze how United States presidentiality is shaped by the rhetoric of post-feminism.

The authors of the article – both assistant professors of communication – argue that the interplay between elite and quotidian discourses illustrates the way in which US presidentiality is shaped by postfeminist rhetoric. In postmodern political culture, the candidate’s image is a hyperreal amalgamation of image fragments generated by the individual politician, his/her campaign communication, news framing, and political pop culture. In the internet age, a politician’s image can also be shaped by non-elite discourses on sites such as Twitter and Tumblr.

Not only does social media allow for engaging the audience directly outside of the context of news and entertainment media, but supporters can also drive the message through sharing, retweeting, and otherwise disseminating relevant text, images, or hyperlinks.Today, we see a payoff in the clash of feminism and post-feminism – can a woman be strong, while still remaining feminine? The authors discuss how mainstreaming the anti-feminist movement through post-feminism may on the surface help soften Hillary’s image and broaden her appeal, but this comes at the expense of being seen as a capable, electable, world leader. Perhaps ironically, Clinton decided to use social media to announce her 2016 bid for president.

Clinton used her Twitter bio to capitalize on the opportunity to be personable and even vulnerable, showing that women define themselves not only by their professional role, but by their passions, their families, and the chapters in their lives. This not only made her Twitter debut a play for young voters, but also potentially for female voters too. She described herself in her inaugural profile as a “wife, mom, lawyer, women & kids advocate, FLOAR, FLOTUS, US Senator, SecState, author, dog owner, hair icon, pantsuit aficionado, glass ceiling cracker, TBD.” Moreover, the timing of Clinton’s first tweet was also notable as it followed the May 2013 Congressional hearings on the State Department’s handling of the terrorist attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, which marked her unfavorability rating at 39 percent (the highest it had been since 2009).

Hillary Clinton is a unique figure in US political culture. In two separate presidential campaigns, the media have tagged her as the frontrunner for her party’s nomination before she even entered the race. Her political resume and broad popularity are cited as evidence that we have entered the postfeminist presidential era. While our presidential politics are decidedly postfeminist, this does not correlate to an easy path for a woman to the Oval Office via #Twitter or otherwise.

Article Source: Texts (and Tweets) from Hillary: Meta-Meming and Postfeminist Political Culture, Karrin Vasby Anderson and Kristina Horn Sheeler, Presidential Studies Quarterly, No. 2, June.

Feature Photo: cc/(Rachel Adshed)