“Most of the images we see are of women who: constrain their bodies… to present themselves in feminine postures and gestures that render them objects, enclose their bodies within the same garments to maintain any small measure of subjectivity, control and manage their docile bodies in a race toward an elusive femininity that is perpetual and exhaustive. We have been taught to desire to be the women we see most in the media, but we want to be… the ones we do not see as often.

We want to be able to engage in repeated subversive performances that displace notions of normative femininity and proliferate gender norms so that it becomes possible for us to be who we are, ourselves. We do not want to exchange one ideal body for another… We do not desire a body like the one on television or in magazines.

We want our bodies to be reflections of ourselves, empowered by our intentionalities and imaginations. In wanting this, in moving toward this, we must be critical of the demands of normative, ideal femininity and choose to parody those performatives that have disciplined us.”

– Wendy A. Burns-Ardolino in
‘Reading Woman: Displacing the Foundations of Femininity’ (2003).