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WHAT DOES CELEBRITY CULTURE REVEAL ABOUT THE CONTEMPORARY REPRESENTATION
OF GENDER POLITICS? DISCUSS WITH REFERENCE TO 1-2 CONTEMPORARY CASE STUDIES
OF YOUR CHOICE.

INTRODUCTION
Gender equality has come a long way over the years, but in terms of the representations of
women in the media, there are still heavy gendered differences and patterns that show
contradictory notions of femininity. To analyse these postfeminist patterns and discourses
in further detail, this research uses Angelina Jolie as a case study, and evaluates the
construction of her image in the media, with a focus on the way it has evolved. In the early
2000s she was constructed as a “wild child”1, but has recently been perceived as an
“inspiration” 2 , after her marriage to Brad Pitt, her humanitarian efforts, and her double
mastectomy throughout the 2010s. This essay answers why this shift may be, arguing that it
is because the media promote particular gendered ideologies of what the ‘right’ and ‘wrong’
kinds of femininity are, and that celebrities allow audiences a way to communicate these
norms amongst each other.

This case study purposefully aims to avoid debates about the authenticity of the ‘real’
Angelina Jolie, and instead focuses her image as a construction and a case study for the
discourses that underpin female celebrities in the media and how it “helps audiences make
sense of the wider world and their place within it.”3 It is what she represents in society that

1 Barron, L,. Celebrity Cultures: An Introduction, (Sage Publications: London, 2015), p. 36
2 ABC News, ‘Inside Angelina Jolie's Double Mastectomy Decision’, 14 May 2013, Accessible on:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVC0dBGJXZ8, [Accessed on 20 April 2016]
3 Meyers, A,. ‘Women, Gossip and Celebrity Online: Gossip Blogs as Feminized Popular Culture’, in Elana Levine (eds),
Cupcakes, Pinterest and Ladyporn, (University of Illinois Press: Chicago, 2015), p. 72
2

has changed, as opposed to the true Angelina Jolie herself. Similarly, it is important to note
that it is not that the structure of the celebrity industry that has changed. Celebrity culture
have always relied on the construction of stars’ personas in media coverage to align with
both their film roles and with society’s expectations, to create a generalised identity that
audiences can actively use to debate their position on larger issues in society, as evidenced
through most Classical Hollywood stars. As Sarah Thomas states, celebrity studies are a
constant “evolution of existing frameworks”4, where the basis for way the media works has
pretty much stayed the same but the messages have been adapted to current issues and
ideologies.

LITERATURE REVIEW
This study is therefore situated within these critical pre-existing frameworks and merging
academic works that look at the different ways female celebrities are constructed,
circulated and consumed compared to their male counterparts, and how contemporary
celebrity promotes particular versions of femininity.

Rosalind Gill’s ‘Postfeminist media culture: elements of a sensibility’, is one of the leading
academic texts in postfeminist celebrity studies. Gill defines postfeminism as a “sensibility” 5
that is ironically made up of an “entanglement of both feminist and anti-feminist themes”6.
Indeed, after the 1980s there was an emergence of neo-liberal ideas and an increased
emphasis on ‘the individual’ having responsibility to their own life trajectories and being

4 Thomas, S, ‘Celebrity in the Twitterverse: history, authenticity and the multiplicity of stardom Situating the newness of
Twitter’, Celebrity Studies Journal, Vol. 5 (3), 2014, p. 247
5 Gill, R., ‘Postfeminist media culture: elements of a sensibility’, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 10 (2), 2007, p. 148
6 Gill, ‘Postfeminist media culture’, (2007), p. 161
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able to make their own choices7. Gill focuses on the contradictory nature of postfeminism,
mentioning how neo-liberalist and postfeminist ideas are not only tied together in media
representations of women, but also conflict with each other. This contradictory nature of
postfeminism is what this study focuses on in relation to Angelina Jolie’s construction.

Following from Gill is Julie Wilson’s piece on ‘Star testing’, which argues that there has been
a shift from female stars being seen as aspirational figures, such as those in the classical
Hollywood Studio System, to a framework where stars now come under more evaluation.
She says that “the result is a peculiar mix of fetishization and assessment, of fanlike
fascination with self-righteous evaluation”8. This is argument is evident in this discourse
analysis of Angelina Jolie, which demonstrates that whilst she is still held as a figure of
admiration due to her status as an A List film actress, she is also held as figure of judgement
and shamelessness, particularly around the early 2000s.

Building on this context, is Sofia Johnson’s chapter in Framing Celebrity, which argues that
gossip stories about celebrities help to “play a role in the negotiation of social norms”9 and
that “a major part of the conversations about these focused on morality [and] how to
behave in society”10. This is a key argument that runs throughout this study, with Angelina
Jolie’s image acting as a transportation of gendered ideologies of female representation for
audiences. However, this study also shows how audiences can also reject these ideas, with
the use of blogs and comment sections being extremely useful.

7 Gill, ‘Postfeminist media culture’, (2007), p. 163
8 Wilson, J., ‘Star testing: the emerging politics of celebrity gossip’, Velvet Light Trap, 26, 2010, p. 29
9 Johansson, S., ‘Sometimes you wanna hate celebrities: tabloid readers and celebrity coverage’, in Su Holmes and Sean
Redmond, Framing celebrity: New directions in celebrity culture, (Routledge: London, 2006), p. 348
10 Johansson, ‘Sometimes you wanna hate celebrities’, (2006), p. 348
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Erin Meyers similarly studies women’s magazines and gossip blogs, arguing that these types
of formats have always focused on “stereotypically feminine concerns such as relationships,
children [and] fashion”11, which are key topics that shape Angelina Jolie’s construction. In
her study, she argues that “gossip about celebrities negotiates the boundaries between the
public and private selves, allowing audiences to use these images as anchors for discussion
of larger social issues that shape everyday life”12.

METHODOLOGY
As well building on these key arguments and pre-existing debates, the methodology for this
research, as like Meyer’s, is mainly focused on primary sources such as women’s magazines
and gossip blogs. The reason behind this is that because these media formats are primarily
targeted at women and are about women. It is therefore where gender issues, like the
monitoring of lifestyle and appearance choices, are most apparent. Primary sources are also
useful, as they provide a helpful way to first create a picture of the specific image and
identity they are giving to Jolie, and also analyse why they are constructing her in that
certain way.

The research also looks at television interviews and the way her constructed persona
aligned across different formats. Interestingly, when interviewed on television, the
conversations surrounding Jolie were much more serious and male orientated, focusing on
her economic success in films or her efforts within politics, in contrast to the way gossip
magazines focus on more feminine, domestic, and private sphere topics. However, in CNN’s

11 Meyers, ‘Women, Gossip and Celebrity Online’, (2015), p. 72
12 Meyers, ‘Women, Gossip and Celebrity Online’, (2015), p. 72
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‘Anderson Cooper 360’ Angelina Jolie special, Gill’s contradictory notion of postfeminism is
evident, because whilst Jolie is involved with global politics, the show focused on her
femininity and the importance of motherhood.

To find these sources in online press databases and on YouTube, I searched for ‘Angelina
Jolie:’ followed by terms such as ‘magazine articles’, ‘1999-2001’, ‘2000 Oscars’,
‘Brangelina’, ‘humanitarianism’, to limit the results down to the most specific and relevant
sources.

ANGELINA JOLIE AS ‘WILD CHILD’ AND ‘BAD GIRL’
Christine Geraghty argues that gossip media surrounding female stars focuses on their
private lives, with particular interest in “love affairs, weddings and divorces… [therefore]
tying female stars, much more than their male counterparts, to the domestic and private
spheres”.13 This is evident throughout the construction of Angelina Jolie’s image in the
media, both before and after her ‘transformation’, which is always related to her romantic
and family relationships.

It was during it was her marriage to Billy Bob Thornton from 2000-2002 that her
construction as a ‘wild child’ began to be made a dominant persona across media platforms.
Gossip blogs and magazines, such as The Sun, reported on “their weird wedding”14, stating
that the couple exchanged blood vials and bought “his n hers burial plots”15. The media

13 Meyers, ‘Women, Gossip and Celebrity Online’, (2015), p. 77
14 The Sun, ‘Give back my blood, Billy Bob!’, 29 July 2002, Accessible on
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/showbiz/bizarre/186198/Give-back-my-blood-Billy-Bob.html [Accessed on 23
April 2016]
15 The Sun, Give back my blood, Billy Bob!’, (2002)
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questioned her choice to incorporate such dark and taboo themes into a wedding, which is
seen as a light and joyous occasion. Similar stories and gossip quickly spread across other
print and online sources, all discussing on her “crazy”16 involvements with “sex dungeon[s]”
and kinky games with knives”17. Whilst the concept of a woman being married is normally
praised in media formats that are targeted at women, the conversations and gossip
surrounding her were predominantly negative. This is arguably because, even though she
was married, her provocative lifestyle was considered masculine behaviour and did not
follow the stereotypical norm of how a woman should behave. Indeed, Imogen Tyler and
Bruce Bennet explain that even in neo-liberal post feminism the “forms of celebrity available
to women are regulated and relentlessly disciplined”.18 Furthermore, not only are these
stories centred around the private sphere, but also about her sex life.

As argued by Gill, in the current postfeminist culture, women are not only objectified as sex
objects in the media, but are now additionally portrayed as ‘active desiring subjects’ who
“choose to present themselves in a seemingly objectified manner because it suits their
liberated interests to do so”19. In these media articles Jolie is seen as a sexual object and
audiences are led to believe this behaviour should be received negatively, because it was
her own choice to present herself in such a manner. In 2000, Jane Magazine (Figure 1), ran a
cover story named “what the hell is wrong with Angelina Jolie?” 20, this highlighted how

16 Leonard, T., ‘How Angelina went from heroin... to heroine: Jolie overcomes troubled past to become top Hollywood
actress, mother-of-six and UN envoy’, Daily Mail, 11 July 2014, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-
2688257/How-Angelina-went-heroin-heroine-Jolie-overcomes-troubled-past-Hollywood-actress-mother-six-UN-
envoy.html, [Accessed on 20 April 2016]
17 The Sun, Give back my blood, Billy Bob!’, (2002)
18 Tyler, I., and Bennett, B., ‘Celebrity chav: Fame, femininity and social class’, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 13(3),
2010, p. 381
19 Gill, ‘Postfeminist media culture’, (2007), p.151
20 Jane Magazine, front cover, February, 2000
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there was a generalised public perception that everyone thought there was something
‘wrong’ with her. This piece also expressed sarcasm in stating “Angelina's perception of
herself is that she's trying to be expressive”21. Similarly, the following June, Elle Magazine
(Figure 2) printed “Wild thing: Will Hollywood tame Angelina Jolie?” 22, tame’ implying she is
an animal that needs to be tamed and that she should change the way she behaves.


Figure 1: Jane Magazine, Feb 2000 Figure 2: Elle Magazine, June 2000

Su Holmes and Diane Negra discuss the gendered differences in celebrity studies, especially
when they “’fall from grace’, arguing that there is a heavy emphasis on policing
inappropriate or ‘out of bounds’ behaviour in women in the current media climate” 23.
Gossip and fan blogs, like Intrepid Media and WatchMojo, demonstrates that her behaviour
was seen as ‘out of bounds’, with many commenting opinions such as “normal people just

21 Jane Magazine, front cover, February 2000
22 Elle Magazine, front cover, June 2000
23 Berridge, S., ‘From the Woman Who ‘Had It All’ to the Tragic, Ageing Spinster: The Shifting Star Persona of Jennifer
Aniston’, in Women, Celebrity And Cultures Of Ageing: Freeze Frame, Susan Holmes et al, (Palgrave Macmillan: Basingstoke,
2015), p.113-114
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do not do stuff like that! Why is she so freakin' out there?!”24, “Angie’s there’s no need to
bring up your bizarre bedroom fetishes during interviews”25, and “Weird. No. Beyond
weird.”26 Johansson argues that celebrity tabloid stories have an important function “in the
construction of a community and in the negotiation of social norms… [acting] as cherished
talking-points in a variety of relationships”27. This is evident in an article by The Observer,
where the writer discussed how they saw a group of Goths, stating that one of them was “a
fleshy, pasty girl with an Angelina-Jolie-at-the-Oscars look”28. Jolie’s image therefore was
seen as an identifiable ‘type’ that audiences, such as this writer, could apply and use in their
own everyday language to communicate with others.

This was further highlighted when Jolie was “accused of stealing another woman’s man”29
and given the title of a “homewrecker”30 by comedian Chelsea Handler and gossip
magazines across the country, after being blamed for the separation of Brad Pitt and
Jennifer Anniston. In these common stories of love affairs and love triangles, the women are
demonised or victimised, whereas the men are excused and addressed with terms such as
“boys will be boys”31. Feminist Chimamanda Adichie builds on this postfeminist discourse,
stating that “we raise girls to see each other as competitors, not for jobs or for

24 Spyropoulos, K., ‘Angelina Jolie the Antichrist?’, Intrepid Media, 21 June 2001, Accessible on
http://intrepidmedia.com/column.asp?id=506, [Accessed on 19 April 2016]
25 Watch Mojo, ‘Jennifer Aniston vs Angelina Jolie: Hollywood Studio’, Uploaded on 29 Feb 2012, Accessible on:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5IJmg9683w [Accessed in 19 April 2016]
26Spyropoulos, ‘Angelina Jolie the Antichrist?’, (2001)
27 Johansson, ‘Sometimes you wanna hate celebrities’, (2006), p. 356
28 The Observer, ‘Do You Have Permission for Those Pants?’, 5 August 2000, Accessible at
http://observer.com/2000/05/do-you-have-permission-for-those-pants/ [Accessed on 19 April 2016]
29 Leonard, ‘How Angelina went from heroin... to heroine’, (2014)
30 Hanlder, C., ‘Chelsea Handler calls Angelina Jolie a cunt & a bitch 12/03/10’, Uploaded by SleeplessMAMS, uploaded on 6
Dec 2010, Accessible at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BY_pW9NJe6Y [Accessed on 22 April 2016]
31 Williams A., ‘Boys Will Be Boys, Girls Will Be Hounded by the Media‘ The New York Times, February 17 2008, Accessible
on http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/17/fashion/17celeb.html [Accessed on 25 April 2016]
9

accomplishments, which I think can be a good thing, but for the attention of men”. 32 This is
evident through the way Jolie and Anniston were placed directly against each other as what
New Idea Magazine (figure 3) called “bitter rivals”33 , making audiences pick sides:
“Pitting ‘Team Anniston’ against ‘Team Jolie’ […] is read as merely
the right of women to compete as equals- never mind that they are
always competing for attention, either the literal attention of a
particular man or the masculinized gaze of public exposure.”34



In contrast to Jolie’s ‘wild child’ persona, Anniston was constructed as “America’s
sweetheart”35 and stereotypical feminine ideal, after playing Rachel Green in the
mainstream TV Show, Friends. YouTuber WatchMojo compares the two in a ‘showdown’,
arguing that “Anniston’s wonderful sense of humour and girl-next-door charm beats out
Jolie’s wild-child persona and…well, strangeness.” 36 Joshua Gamson comments that women

32 Adichie, C., ‘We Should All Be Feminists’, TEDx, Uploaded by TEDx Talks, Uploaded on 12 April 2013, Accessible at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hg3umXU_qWc#action=share, [Accessed on 20th April 2016]
33 New Idea Magazine, front cover, August 2014
34 Schwartz, M., ‘The Horror of Something to See’, in In the Limelight and Under the Microscope: Forms and Functions of
Female Celebrity, Su Holmes and Diane Negra, (The Continuum International Publishing Group: London, 2011), p. 236
35 Watch Mojo, ‘Jennifer Aniston vs Angelina Jolie: Hollywood Studio’, (2012)
36 Watch Mojo, ‘Jennifer Aniston vs Angelina Jolie: Hollywood Studio’, (2012)
Figure 4: Sunday Magazine, July 2005

Figure 3: New Idea, August 2014
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have always been positive and negative ways to exist as a female, particularly in relation to a
“virgin-whore dichotomy” 37, where women are either innocent and therefore victims
(Anniston) or women as sexually empowered and therefore villains (Jolie). The cover of
Sunday Magazine (figure 4) literally pictures her with devil horns on her head, surrounded by
red writing that says “the devil in Miss Jolie”38. Rebecca Williams similarly agrees with this in
her early analysis of Drew Barrymore who, like Jolie, “represent[ed] unacceptable
femininity”39 and “often plays the role of temptress or vamp, and she is often objectified and
shown semi-naked, although her explicit sexuality is often aggressive and transgressive”40.

This ‘virgin/whore’ dichotomy is also at work within issues of class. Imogen Tyler and Bruce
Bennett discuss this intersection of gender with class, and the ways female celebrities are
constructed in relation to their actions and appearances. Angelina Jolie complicates this
boundary because whilst she isn’t technically marked as working-class economically, she is
representationally labelled as transgressing normative codes of middle-class femininity. She
did not conform to the stereotypical middle-class norms of glamor and dignity, and her
behaviour was seen to be more similar to a working-class
femininity. Beverly Skeggs states that there is a difference
between middle-class/working class femininities and that each
class is expected to act differently. This dichotomy functions to

37 Gamson, J., ‘Jessica Hahn, media whore: sex scandals and female publicity’, Critical Studies in Media Communication,
18(2), 2001, p. 158
38 Sunday Magazine, front cover July 2005
39 Williams, R., ‘From Beyond Control to In Control: Investigating Drew Barrymore’s Feminist Agency/ Authorship’, in
Stardom and Celebrity: A Reader, Su Holmes and Sean Redmond, (SAGE: London, 2008) p.116
40 Williams, ‘From Beyond Control to In Control’, (2008), p. 114
Figure 5: Rolling Stone Magazine, Aug 1999
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map out what constitutes as “appropriate”41 femininities for each class. Her behaviour was
seen as shocking and entertaining for the way it mimicked stories like “the dangerous,
libidinal lower classes”42. Indeed, working-class femininity is often marked as sexually
excessive, which is at work within Jolie’s image, especially in magazines covers such as
Rolling Stone43 (figure 5). Tyler and Bennett state that they “are ‘repositories of negative
value, bad taste’…We laugh at their faux pas and share our disgust at their shameless
promiscuity, tasteless lifestyles”44, which was exactly the way gossip media also presented
Angelina Jolie. Anne Worrall suggests a new figure of “the delinquent ‘bad girl’” which acts
as a “cautionary narrative”45.

ANGELINA AS ‘DEVOTED MOTHER, WIFE AND HUMANITARIAN’
If Angelina Jolie as ‘wild child’ was constructed for celebrity consumers as a “cautionary
narrative”, then her representational transformation to Angelina Jolie as a ‘devoted
mother46, wife and humanitarian’ is constructed as one of “inspiration”47.

After analysing how negatively Jolie was portrayed in the early 2000s, it may have appeared
as though nothing could change her ‘bad girl’ status. However, as Negra argues,
“postfeminist culture suggests that the solution to this […] crisis lies in becoming more
feminine, by finding a (heteronormative) romantic partner and having a baby, thus

41 Skeggs, B., Formations of Class and Gender: Becoming Respectable, (SAGE: London, 1997), p. 108
42 Tyler and Bennett (2010) ‘Celebrity chav: Fame, femininity and social class’, 2010, p. 382
43 Rolling Stone Magazine, front cover, 19 Aug 1999, 819 (1)
44 Tyler and Bennett (2010) ‘Celebrity chav: Fame, femininity and social class’, 2010, p. 382
45 Tyler and Bennett (2010) ‘Celebrity chav: Fame, femininity and social class’, 2010, p. 390
46 Watch Mojo, ‘Jennifer Aniston vs Angelina Jolie: Hollywood Studio’, (2012)
47 ABC News, ‘Inside Angelina Jolie's Double Mastectomy Decision’, (2013)
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‘forcefully renewing conservative social ideologies”48. This is the change that Angelina Jolie’s
image undertook after her marriage to Brad Pitt, her adoption of children and
humanitarianism, reverting to the ideal neo-liberal female that the media desired, and
therefore rewarding her with positive coverage. Agreeing is Jeremiah Favara who says
“Jolie’s maternal choices are at the heart of this transformation49. Just like Gamsons ‘virgin/
whore’ dichotomy, the boundaries for female representation appear very fixed and it would
have been questionable for Jolie to still engage with knives and blood vials whilst being a
mother of six, because society expects mothers to be good role models. Jemima Repo and
Riina Yrjola says that “from being decadent, unstable and sexually perverse, she [Angelina
Jolie] transformed into a figure of humility, propriety and sexual modesty.”50 In 2007, the
gossip blog ‘Celebitchy’ wrote an article about “Angelina Jolie’s Changing Oscar Style”51,
being one example of how her image physically went from gothic black to angelic white,
showing her transition from the dark and into the light.

There are also gendered expectations on the way men are meant to behave and look, and
Brad Pitt performs to the hegemonic male ideal, whereas Billy Bob Thornton was, like Jolie,
more transgressional of these norms. In a most post-feminist fashion, the way the media
presents her therefore suggests that her image and behaviour is thus being controlled by
what men she is with, and that it is Brad Pitt who has ‘tamed’ her. Indeed, Vanessa Diaz

48 Negra (2009) in Berridge, ‘From the Woman Who ‘Had It All’ to the Tragic, Ageing Spinster’ in Women, Celebrity and
Cultures of Ageing: Freeze Frame, p. 117
49 Favara, J., ‘A Maternal Heart: Angelina Jolie, choices of maternity, and hegemonic femininity in People magazine’,
Feminist Media Studies, Vol 15(4), 2015, p. 626
50 Repo, J., and Yrjola, R., ‘The Gender Politics of Celebrity Humanitarianism in Africa’, International Journal of Politics, 13
(1) 2011, p.49
51 Celebitchy, ‘Angelina Jolie’s Changing Oscar Style, 8 February 2007, Accessible at
http://www.celebitchy.com/2887/angelina_jolies_changing_oscar_style/ [Accessed on 20 April 2016]
13

discusses how the media have coined the couple with the term “Brangelina”52, blurring
them into one person and brand, and devaluing her. Their wedding was a small family affair,
and Jolie’s veil was made up of her children’s drawings, leading celebrity magazine People to
call it a “Dream Day”.53

Following from this, People magazine continued to play a massive part in Angelina Jolie’s
new construction not only as a ‘devoted mother’, but a humanitarian. This intersection of
gender politics with global politics evidences how complex postfeminism can be, and how it
crosses over into many different issues. Holmes and Jermyn state that “although
postfeminist culture celebrates the notion of choice and empowerment for women, these
choices are deeply constrained and limited.”54 Women are expected to make their own
choices, but also make sure that they make the right ones that coincide with gender norms.
Jeremiah Favara agrees, arguing that “Jolie functions as a figure of successful femininity
because her choices result in the right kind of transformation; a transformation predicated
on maternity as a valued bodily aspect of femininity”.55 Politics have always been a male-
dominated field that has been focused on the public sphere, with male philanthropic
celebrities such as Bono and Bob Geldof being praised for their fund raising concerts,
charitable campaigns and political views. In contrast, Jolie’s coverage for her humanitarian
involvement is always written with a focus on motherhood and her marriage. This is evident
in CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° special, ‘Angelina Jolie: Her Mission and Motherhood’,
where he reports that “it should come as no surprise that when Angelina Jolie decided she

52 Diaz, V., ‘Brad & Angelina: And Now… Brangelina’, in, First Comes Love: Power Couples, Celebrity Kinship and Cultural
Politics, Shelley Cobb and Neil Ewen, (Bloomsbury: London, 2015), P.275
53 People Magazine, front cover, 15 September 2014
54 Holmes and Jermyn, Women, Celebrity And Cultures Of Ageing, (2015), p. 17
55 Favara, ‘A Maternal Heart’, (2015), p. 637
14

wanted to be a mother, she'd approach it with the same humanitarian spirit that guides the
rest of her life, building a global village under her own roof.”56 Anne Jerslev comments that
Angelina Jolie’s “humanitarian trips [are] transformed and translated into gossip”57, acting
as yet another way for female consumers to process how her actions are received in order
to make sense of what is right and wrong for females society. Jerslev says:

“she is a product and productive of hegemonic femininity. Jolie represents
an expression of female moral authority emerging from a historically
specific moment in the American mediascape; a moment characterized by
narratives of choice, individualism, and maternity, all of which converge
to signal successful femininity” 58.

This transition to marriage and motherhood was not only a way to promote gendered
ideologies that the right way to exist as a woman is to be a wife and a mother, but allowed a
way to articulate Richard Dyer’s ‘ordinary/extraordinary’.59 This can be evidenced in People
(Figure 6) where the headline reads “Working Mom”60,
featuring a picture of Jolie holding her baby under her
arm with a smile on her face, making her appear ordinary
and like any other ‘working mom’, but the fact that she
balances motherhood with an acting career also makes
her extraordinary. With the narrative of transformation,
she is seen as both ordinary and extraordinary, firstly for

56 CNN, Anderson Cooper 360 degrees, ‘Angelina Jolie: Her Mission and Motherhood’, Aired 22:00pm on June 20 2006, ET,
quote from 06:57, Accessible on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjvjUwgH0xk, [Accessed on 24 April 2016]
57 Jerslev, A., ‘Celebritification, Authenticity, Gossip: The Celebrity Humanitarian’, Nordicom Review, 35, (2014), p 172
58 Favara, ‘A Maternal Heart’, (2015) p. 627
59 Dyer,R., Stars, (BFI: London, 1998) p. 43
60 People Magazine, ‘Working Mom: Angelina Jolie’, 64(10), September 2005, Accessible on:
http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20144229,00.html [Accessed on 18 April 2016]
Figure 6: People Magazine, Sept 2005
15

having issues and a “troubled past” 61, but has had extraordinary achievement in
overcoming them and reinventing herself.”62. Therefore, the boundaries of Dyers paradigm
may be too limited, with Jolie demonstrating it can sometimes be a lot more complex, with
crossovers in each.

In 2013, Angelina Jolie wrote an open letter in The New York Times titled ‘My Medical
Choice’, where she revealed that she had a double mastectomy and will have her ovaries
removed. This appeared to further her media transformation into to becoming
‘extraordinary’ and an “inspiration” 63. She stated that she wrote it “because I hope that
other women can benefit from my experience”64 and urged that “I do not feel any less of a
woman. I feel empowered that I made a strong choice that in no way diminishes my
femininity.”65 Here, ideas of choice and the female body are at the heart of the piece. The
female body has always been a key part of femininity, and the letter touches upon anxieties
that the physical and metaphorical loss of her female organs may make her less of a woman.
The neo-liberal element of choice therefore acts as a way to counteract this loss and
empower her, relating back to Meyer’s argument that audiences can use these celebrity
images as “anchors for discussion of larger social issues that shape everyday life”66.
However, the letter states that the reason behind her medical choice was to be there for her

61 Leonard, ‘How Angelina went from heroin... to heroine’, (2014)
62 Leonard, ‘How Angelina went from heroin... to heroine’, (2014)
63 Ross, E., and Walsh, A., ‘Tomb Parader’, 3 June 2013, The Sun, Accessible at
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4952155/angelina-jolie-world-war-z-premiere-London.html, [Accessed on
25 April 2016]
64 Jolie, A., ‘My Medical Choice’, New York Times, May 14 2013, Accessible at
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/14/opinion/my-medical-choice.html?_r=0, [Accessed on 29 April 2016]
65 Jolie, ‘My Medical Choice’, 2013,
66 Meyers, ‘Women, Gossip and Celebrity Online’, (2015), P. 72
16

children and her husband. Again, neo-liberal themes of choice and postfeminism themes of
motherhood both intersect and contradict each other.

Jermyn adds that “motherhood, like stardom, is both ordinary/extraordinary”67, so when
put together creates the perfect publicity strategy. This is evidenced in Stylist Magazine,
which quotes that she is “simply too impressive to be ordinary, and her achievements- and
her lifestyle choices- have had a polarising effect….you don’t get many movie stars like
Angelina Jolie”68. She is constructed as ordinary for her private life and medical experiences,
but is also presented as being extraordinary by her ability to balance this with her
professional life, invoking what Holmes and Negra calls the notion of “the aspirational image
of the ‘yummy mummy’ who can apparently ‘have it all’”69. Buzzfeed writer, Anne Peterson
states:

“Jolie’s post-2005 image took the ordinary — she was a working mom
trying to make her relationship work — and not only amplified it, but
infused it with the rhetoric and imagery of globalism and liberalism.”70

However, as with most acts of goodwill, the true intentions behind her adoptions and
humanitarian efforts are sometimes met with scepticism. Indeed, ABC News wrote an article

67 Jermyn, D., 'Still something else besides a mother? Negotiating celebrity motherhood in Sarah Jessica Parker's star story',
Social Semiotics, 18(2), (2008), p. 170
68 Stylist Magazine, ‘We’ll have what she’s having’, May 2014, p. 53, Accessible on http://www.gotceleb.com/angelina-
jolie-stylist-uk-magazine-may-2014-2014-05-25.html/angelina-jolie-stylist-magazine-may-2014-06, [Accessed on 27 April
2016]
69 Holmes, S., and Negra, D., ‘Introduction’, In the Limelight and Under the Microscope, p. 9
70 Peterson, A., ‘Angelina Jolie’s Perfect Game’, May 29 2014, Buzzfeed, Accessible at
https://www.buzzfeed.com/annehelenpetersen/angelina-jolies-perfect-game?utm_term=.diWXkq8mj#.wjGQJzABp,
[Accessed on 29 April 2016]
17

asking “Black Babies: Hollywood’s Hottest Accessory?”71 and with many other accusing her
of “collecting children like handbags”72. Indeed, Angela McRobbie condemns “the cult of
celebrity motherhood”, for the way maternity has become “fully incorporated into the
language of self-perfectibility”73. By ‘self-perfectibility’, McRobbie ties together ideas of the
‘perfect’ feminine behaviour with ideas of the ‘perfect’ balance between being both
ordinary and extraordinary.

CONCLUSION
In conclusion, this idea of displaying the ‘right kind’ of feminine behaviour, such as
maternity, is the underlining message for women in postfeminist and neo-liberal celebrity
culture. Not only was Angelina Jolie’s behaviour originally criticised by gossip blogs and
magazines due to the fact it did not suit the stereotypical ideal of femininity, but it also
demonised her sexual liberation. This demonisation was further made evident when she
was constructed as a homewrecker and pitted again Jennifer Anniston, who represented a
more feminine image. However, once she became a mother and wife, her construction
became more positive, with even her humanitarian efforts focusing on themes of
motherhood. From this analysis, not only is it clear just how fickle the media are with their
representation of celebrities, changing their representations depending on what gendered
messages they portray to audiences, but it further proves just how much of a construction
vehicle really celebrities are. It will be interesting to see how the media perception of

71 Fisher, L., ‘Black Babies: Hollywood’s Hottest Accessory?’, March 31 2009, ABC NEWS, Accessible on
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=7218470, [Accessed on 29 April 2016]
72 Peterson, ‘Angelina Jolie’s Perfect Game’, 2014
73 Jermyn, 'Still something else besides a mother?’, (2008), p. 166
18

Angelina Jolie’s image continues to change over the next ten years with her age, relationship
status and choice of film projects all being possible factors.


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