Invoking the feminine physical ideal: bitch-slapping, she-men and butch girls

This paper presents the results of research on the discursive construction of one aspect of gender identity: the female physical ideal. Applying Butler's (1993) theory of performativity to a real-life local context, it critically analyses how a group of young South African women discursively construct and perform the notion of the ideal feminine body in conversation with their female friends. Furthermore, it uses elements of the Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) framework (Fairclough, 1992; 2001) to provide a linguistic analysis of the ideologies which underlie this construction. Recognising that ideologies are unstable and dynamic, it seeks to account for the ideological tensions and ambiguities in the discourses surrounding the feminine body.