An intersectional approach to representations of girlhood in the handmaid's tale franchise: beyond gender constraints and (mis)represented narratives

• Autores: Sara Tabuyo Santaclara
• Directores de la Tesis: María Belén Martín Lucas (dir. tes.)
• Lectura: En la Universidade de Vigo ( España ) en 2025
• Idioma: inglés
• Tribunal Calificador de la Tesis: Libe García Zarranz (presid.), Rubén Jarazo Álvarez (secret.), Andrea Robin Ruthven (voc.)
• Programa de doctorado: Programa de Doctorado en Estudios Ingleses Avanzados: Lingüística, Literatura y Cultura por la Universidad de A Coruña; la Universidad de Santiago de Compostela y la Universidad de Vigo
• Materias:
  • Lingüística
    • Lingüística aplicada
      • Lengua y literatura
  • Ciencias de las artes y las letras
    • Teoría análisis y critica literarias
      • Análisis literario
    • Teoría análisis y critica de las bellas artes
      • Cinematografía
• Enlaces
  • Tesis en acceso abierto en: Investigo
• Resumen

  • This thesis provides an intersectional analysis of the representations of girlhood in the productions that compose the universe of The Handmaid's Tale, that is, The Handmaid's Tale series, directed by Bruce Miller, The Handmaid's Tale novel and the sequel The Testaments, both written by Margaret Atwood. This research approaches these interconnected texts as a transmedia franchise that depicts experiences of women and girls in a dystopian setting. Girlhood is explored as a relational, diverse cultural category rather than a uniform one by connecting the narrative with the analytical framework of girlhood studies and the notion of intersectionality. Gender and queer theory are used to explore the imposed gender roles that girls must adopt in this fictional universe, encouraging them to perform a series of rituals and actions while containing their bodies, seen as abject by the regime. Affect theory is used to analyze how the girls contest these restrictive gender norms through daring actions despite the isolation that surrounds them. Besides, this thesis also examines the representation of race and racism across the different texts that compose the corpus. It offers a critical view of the franchise's reproduction of colonial violence and connects the fiction with colonial legacies affecting Indigenous women and girls while recognizing their resistance through decolonizing strategies.