E-Zines: Third Wave Feminist

Moving into the globalized, digitalized third wave of feminism, e-zines have become a popular method of transmitting information to a wide variety of audiences. Third wave feminist e-zines are digitalized newsletters that convey messages that seek to improve conditions for women, girls, and other marginalized individuals. An e-zine is very similar to a third wave feminist Riot Grrrl zine, in which the content is political, rhetorical, persuasive, artistic, and homemade. Some e-zines appear very do-it-yourself (DIY), with scanned-in sketches, while others use computerized graphics or “ready-mades.” With the advent of “new media” technologies, third wave feminist e-zines can now feature recordings, clips, sound and image bites, streaming video, live performances, and “behind-the-scenes footage,” both historical and contemporary. They commonly feature the art of dissent or uprising. Some are also “fanzines” and function as tribute journals or updates for fans about a certain person in the third wave feminist scene.

Following in the U.S. American tradition of “Revolution Girl Style Now,” many other countries are starting to use third wave feminist e-zines as a chief method of communication. For example, in the Philippines, Pinay zines have become popular. However, because zine making is no longer a response to a male-dominated punk rock music scene, some see the third wave feminist “zinesters” as mere “scenesters” who are “selling out” and becoming a mere trend. Some ask, Where is the revolution now? Where is the riot? and Why is it so quiet?

This is not to say, however, that third wave feminist e-zines are not prompting any kind of political change, because in fact they are. They have been used by both radical and liberal feminist girl groups to address issues within and surrounding the music industry, the clothing industry, homelessness, pornography, the crisis in the Middle East, the depiction of women in the media, women's health and reproductive rights, the idea of “going green,” gay and lesbian marriage, and gays and lesbians in the military, among other issues.

E-zines are not designed to achieve financial success. They are preferred by some groups over paper zines because of their accessibility and because they are eco-friendly. However, in places where the power of the Internet is not widespread, many groups tend to have both an e-zine and a paper zine. Some e-zines, like their paper-zine predecessors, are similar to activity books, inviting reader input to fill in the blanks or help create the messages. They also often contain alternative comics, such as Alison Bechdel's Dykes to Watch Out For (1986).

Gender and media scholars have considered third wave feminist e-zines from a variety of different perspectives. Some see the e-zines as a logical outgrowth of the paper zines of the third wave feminist Riot Grrrl movement. Others see them as pure fun and fancy or as nonsensical or apolitical and utterly postmodern. Still others see them as similar to teen magazines in general, telling girls a different way to [Page 85]be, but nevertheless serving in a governing or controlling capacity for girls. Coming into effect in the context of neoliberal globalization, third wave feminist e-zines have also been seen as commodifying the ideas of the third wave of feminism, making them more candy-coated and palatable for a relatively homogenized readership and contributing to e-commerce. However, because those girls who create e-zines usually create them on a volunteer basis and do not get paid for their work, this argument has yet to be accepted by most gender and media scholars. In fact, Angela McRobbie notes that sociologists have “perhaps ignored this social dimension because to them the very idea that style could be purchased over the counter [goes] against the grain of those analyses which saw the adoption … of punk style as an act of creative defiance far removed from the mundane act of buying.”

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