Debating the F1 grid girls: feminist tensions in British popular culture

Abstract

The banning of the Formula 1 (F1) “grid girls” in January 2018 produced a contentious debate on women’s autonomy and sexual capital in the British media. This debate is symbolic of a wider trend towards post-feminist ideology, in which sexualised displays of the female body have come to be perceived as liberating self-sufficient choices which emphasise agency and serve to benefit women. This paper draws upon post-feminist responses to the banning of the F1 grid girls and implements a discursive analysis of a variety of news sites in order to identify the reoccurring themes that characterise post-feminist debate in this area. The dominant themes identified include [dis]empowerment, freedom of choice, and disputed understandings of feminism which are discussed from a critical feminist perspective. This paper thus contributes towards perceptions of the parameters of sexism in British popular culture and analyses continued transformations in feminist thought.