Sex and the City

Sex and the City burst on the scene in 1998 with a splash, a television series on HBO based on the idea of “women having sex like men,” as the main character Carrie Bradshaw proclaims in the pilot episode. For six seasons, four best friends dated their way through the city of New York: Carrie Bradshaw, Charlotte York, Miranda Hobbs, and Samantha Jones slept with hundreds of men, drank thousands of cosmopolitans, and spent what seems like millions on designer shoes. To the uncritical viewer, this series appears to finally offer women the power and agency that they have been denied for centuries; these best friends take control of their sexuality, and offer the possibility that a woman is not necessarily a “slut” if she enjoys sex: in an exchange between friends, Charlotte asks, “Why do you always have to talk about sex like that?” to which Samantha answers, “Because I can” (“Are We Sluts?”).

As Sharon Marie Ross contends in “Talking Sex: Comparison Shopping Through Female Conversation in HBO’s Sex and the City,” “women’s sexual desires have been linked historically to a desire for consumable goods” (Ross, 111). While this series is clearly not the first instance in which feminine sexuality and consumption have been linked, the negative consequences of such a link may not be recognized for their full value while Sex and the City attempts to redefine the modern woman as one who is independent and empowered, the show’s emphasis on consumption and materialism reinforces traditional hegemonic feminine roles. Specifically, this hegemonic portrayal is perpetuated by the way in which the characters consume as a coping mechanism, use shopping to fill the romantic void in their lives, obsess over their appearances in order to attract men, and emphasize and idolize luxury and designer commodities. Thus, in this blog, we argue that although at first look this series may appear to be a significant movement forward for the empowerment of women, it in fact simply perpetuates existing belittling and demeaning hegemonic stereotypes that reduces women to narcissistic shopaholics.

We introduce this concept to you in the form of a blog to mirror the writing style that main character, Carrie Bradshaw, uses herself. Bradshaw’s career as the author of a column flourished as she wrote about her experiences and what it meant to be a woman in New York City. Reflecting back on the Sex and the City series, it seems only appropriate to present our ideas in the forms of short editorials, all of which relate back to our main thesis. Although Bradshaw’s works were published in print, we take a more modern approach to editorials, and can only imagine that if Carrie were still writing “Sex and the City” today, in an attempt to remain as contemporary as possible, she would be doing the same. Additionally, the concept of “fashion blogs” center around commodification, materialism, and the idea that a woman is only truly fulfilled through consumption. Given this recent fad, fashion blogs offer a manner through which we can present both our argument and connect it to the current societal context, offering the idea that our argument and potential consequences are not limited to the world of Sex and the City.

– Allison Deissler, Arielle Green, Brittany Watts, Laura Flaum, & Valerie Kuznik