“First-Person Politics: Strategies of Latin/x American Women to Change the Neoliberal Requirements for Empowerment and Inclusion One Share, Like, Subscribe at a Time”
This project investigates the strategies of Latin/x American women who have used their voices and influence in the media to break barriers, enter spaces that have excluded them, and advocate for changes so that young girls like them do not have to face these same limitations. Chapter One investigates politicians (Dolores Huerta, Sonia Sotomayor, Michelle Bachelet, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) who, from their political power positions, interweave personal stories with their accomplishments to provide role models for these careers. Chapter Two identifies actresses (Salma Hayek, America Ferrera, Diane Guerrero, Gina Rodriguez, Yalitza Aparicio Martínez, María Mercedes Coroy, Daniela Vega) who combine their personal stories with activist causes to alter representation in TV and film. The YouTubers in Chapter Three (Dulce Candy, Lele Pons, Bethany Mota, Yuya), bolster a rhetoric of empowerment to encourage girls/women to be their own bosses. A pattern emerges in both hemispheres where influential women from various sectors (politics, Hollywood, YouTube) have initially gained attention through their careers, garnered a following on social media, and from this place of power have used their platform to share personal stories in order to offer counter narratives and advocate for the possibilities, opportunities, and inclusion of the next generation of young Latin/x American girls and women. I argue that a mainstream entrance does not invalidate their effort or ability to retain their identity from within the institutions, industries, and markets, but rather that this entrance is a necessary component in a strategy to combine personal stories with activist causes in order to alter the requirements for entry and prevent the cycle of identity sacrifice and lack of representation from continuing in the future. In some cases, their activism produces ruptures which challenge the dominant and existent structures that exclude and make girls feel like they cannot be themselves, but in other cases, their activism becomes a brand that helps them compete in an individualistic, neoliberal market where identity is commodified. Ultimately, these case studies analyzing first person accounts of autobiographies, interviews, and YouTube videos, reveal the message these influential women are sending to young girls/women about identidad, Latinidad, and personal power through autobiographical storytelling and self-advocacy.
