1. Lesbian Enculturation
A Deeper Look at Lesbians in Mainstream Media
Amanda Rodriguez
Anthropology 353: Sex and Gender
“Lesbian Enculturation: A Deeper Look at Lesbians in Mainstream Media” was written for
Western Washington University’s Anthropology of Sex and Gender course. The essay draws
from prominent lesbian figures in mainstream media by comparing Ellen DeGeneres, Tegan and
Sara, as well as popular television show The L Word to real lesbian subcultures. The findings
reveal heteronormative ideals are being projected onto lesbians in the media.
February 21, 2014

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There is much talk about the way media portrays women in today’s society, but relatively
little talk of how media portrays the women who do not fit the heteronormative standard. As gay
rights are presented more toward the forefront of civil rights issues there has been a cultural shift
that allows more gay and lesbian individuals to be a larger part of television, advertisements,
music, and other forms of entertainment. This research paper looks at lesbians in the media such
as talk show host Ellen DeGeneres, a popular television show called The L Word, and the
musical duo Tegan and Sara. Distinctions and similarities between what is being portrayed as the
lesbian identity, aspects of the real US lesbian subculture, and a small sample of the general
public’s assumptions about lesbians are made throughout the paper. By clarifying those
distinctions and similarities it becomes visible that some of the androcentric notions about
relationships, women, and cisgender norms are prominent in lesbian based media outlets. The
findings reveal that although lesbians in the media today are portrayed as powerful feminists,
there is still some level of heteronormativity in what is being shown. Behind the progressive
façade, lesbian women are being objectified and suppressed through hidden androcentric themes.
The sample used to create the charts in this paper is made up of eight lesbians, one gay
man, three bisexual men, twelve bisexual women, eleven straight women, and four straight men,
all from various backgrounds. The survey was posted to different social media sites, and was
shared by many different participants to allow for people of all ages, races, socioeconomic
standings, education levels or religions to participate. All questions were multiple choice,
participants were allowed to choose as many answers as they wanted, and each question had the
option to write in a different answer which is shown on each of the three graphs as “other”. Two
of the three charts shown (figures A and C) include all thirty nine participants, while the other
chart (figure B) only includes the eight lesbian participants, as most other participants had not

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seen more than one or two episodes of the show on which the question was based. Main stream
media is what this paper focuses on, though there are many other ways to begin understanding
what it means to be a contemporary lesbian in the US.
Today there is a myriad of videos, websites, and self evaluated articles that help females
of all ages begin to take on the “role of a lesbian” in contemporary US culture. From smiling
correctly to wearing certain clothing styles, to knowing how to properly clip one’s fingernails
there is a signature lesbian style that most lesbians in their teens to late twenties are assumed to
know, even if they do not practice these customs themselves. This is said to make it easier for
one woman to be able to spot another who shares the same sexual identity, making it easier to
form a connection between them. Sarina Graf, a gold star lesbian from Seattle who is very much
a part of Seattle’s lesbian subculture, states that “knowing about Ellen DeGeneres, The L Word,
and Tegan and Sara are a few staples of being a woman loving woman in the Pacific Northwest.
If you don’t know about these things other lesbians will seriously question your validity as a
member in the gay community”. Yet when asked about how lesbians are portrayed to the general
public through these public figures, Graf said she had not thought much about it. It then became
apparent that if she were to think about it, chances are she would begin with Ellen (Graf, 2014).
Ellen DeGeneres is known for her televised hosting abilities, sense of humor, activism
and sexual orientation. Her career among the stars really took off during the later 1980s, when
anti-sodomy laws were considered constitutional and being gay was something many people in
the United States preferred to keep hidden. According to Lynn Neary on a section of All Things
Considered in the NPR News database, Ellen decided to come out as being lesbian not too long
after the Defense of Marriage Act passed in 1996; a time when heterosexual people weren’t
thinking about gay and lesbian rights at all. Her sponsors pulled the plug on her television show

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but that did not stop her career from taking off to new levels of fame. Not many years later she
became the face of a changing cultural perspective on gay and lesbian issues, when homosexual
people were starting to become more and more accepted for being gay (Neary, 2013).
Nowadays, most publically seen of Ellen outside her own talk show is of her marriage
with actress Portia De Rossi across entertainment magazines everywhere, keeping her career’s
correlation to political issues for gay rights on cue as gay marriage sweeps the nation. When the
small random sample was asked what Ellen signifies, 44% said women’s rights, with 37% saying
she stands for lesbian rights and just being herself. The “other” category that was chosen
generally had answers along the lines of “being a good person” or “having fun” (shown in Figure
A below). Neary’s guest speaker Jessica Halem stated that as Ellen’s activism and television
show grew to encompass more issues, people began to see her as a celebrity that any woman
could relate to and enjoy whether they were a housewife in Ohio or a lesbian in Seattle. Ellen has
managed to break the barriers between “normal” hetero women and their counterparts, showing
that women are all the same in that they simply like to laugh and have fun no matter what their
orientation (Halem, 2013).
[Figure A]
What does Ellen stand for?
Lesbian rights
Women's rights
Just herself
Butch lesbians
Nothing in particular
Not sure
Other

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Even with Ellen’s activism and gay pride, whether it is intended or not, she still manages
to fit into certain androcentric stereotypes. She is a cisgender individual who takes on a “butch”
role, as her femininity is often masked behind pant suits, short hair and boyish quirks. Her wife
Portia is generally seen as the “femme” in the relationship, often shown wearing dresses and
heels. This butch and femme construction has been used a couple of different ways based on the
time period one is looking at. In the 1980s the second wave of feminism used butch and femme
relationships as proof of flexibility within gender construction (Levitt and Hiestand 2005, 39-43).
Another way to look at the butch/femme combo was considered in 2004, as one study talks about
how femmes embody the “classic woman” while butch women embody masculine ideals;
meaning they conform to the heteronormative relationship construction where “manly traits” are
still something women yearn for. This could arguably be one of the reasons Ellen was able to
make it during a time when being gay was not widely accepted because she still adhered to the
cisgender norm as well as the androcentric view of proper relationships, as she had one
masculine and one feminine person in her own relationship. Without a doubt Ellen was able to
become the bridge between hetero and homo socialization during a time when homosexual
people needed most to be seen as regular people, but as times have changed so have the bridges
being used to cross between heterosexual and homosexual subcultures (Levitt and Hiestand
2005, 39-43).
By 2004 the popular TV show titled The L Word began to air, bringing lesbians into
mainstream culture unlike ever before. Eight out of eight lesbians who participated in the survey
for this paper admit to continually watching The L Word at some point in time, and easily
considered it a vital part of lesbian subculture in the US. The show follows one group of lesbians
around Los Angeles and delves into contemporary lesbian issues while simultaneously limiting

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cultural ideas about lesbians. According to Pei-Wen Lee and Michaela Meyer’s article titled “We
All Have Feelings For Our Girlfriends: Progressive (?) Representations of Lesbian Lives on The
L Word”, each character in the first season symbolizes certain struggles lesbians generally face at
some point in their lifetime whether it be familial estrangement, coming out, switching over from
heterosexuality into homosexuality, starting a family, or obvious androcentrism both in and out
of the workplace. As progressive as these issues being brought to the mainstream might be, Lee
and Meyer also list some of the limitations other parts of the show might have on how lesbians
are being perceived by The L Word viewers. Some of these limitations include over-sexualization
of lesbian relationships, reinforcement of the binaries within sexual orientation and gender
identity, giving in to the male gaze, and strongly dividing homosexual and heterosexual groups
(Lee and Meyer 2010, 236-239).
In the article by Lee and Meyer it is said that by over-sexualizing lesbian (or any)
relationships there is an implication that the relationships themselves are void of enough
meaning to keep the storyline interesting. They also imply sex scenes keep the door open for
male viewers to potentially enjoy watching the series. In addition to this, the women can all
“pass as straight” which according to Lee and Meyer contributes to the idea of the male gaze as
one large focus on the producers’ minds. The separation of the main group from any
heterosexual groups in the show implies queer is still the “other”, and cannot fit easily within
heteronormative society. These underlying notions leave the public to assume certain inaccurate
parts of lesbian subculture to be true. The eight gay women who participated in the survey for
this paper also had a fairly high rate of saying the underlying themes in The L Word portrayed
lesbians as people who highly value sex, have intricate and somewhat incestual sexual relations
between members of their own community, and are prone to committing adultery (as shown in

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Figure B). Although there is some liberation of lesbians in that they are finally allowed in
mainstream television, there are still some very heteronormative themes that shape lesbians into
something they are not. Even their relationships are deemed unfulfilling enough to the point
where they need a sex scene every quarter of the hour, which is demeaning in and of itself (Lee
and Meyer 2010, 236-250).
Lesbians in the real world do not reflect much of the underlying themes of The L Word.
Assertions made by lesbian women during the survey for this paper say that lesbians do not value
sex any more so than other group of people in the US, they get along with people of all
orientations, and they certainly do not dress only to impress others. The idea that a woman who
dresses in a particular way is doing so for the enjoyment of the opposite sex is one androcentric
notion that does not take into account the idea that person’s clothing styles reflect the value they
see in themselves, and the practicalities or realities of everyday life (London and Kelly, 2013).
When bringing this argument into the mix one could say that the women of The L Word were not
dressed that way simply for the purpose of potentially gaining more male viewers, but to show
they had a high sense of self-worth. If this were the case, the new underlying message would be
that only women with classic feminine looks would have any sense of self worth. If that were
true women with short hair who preferred wearing pants and disliked high heels should then be
deemed lacking in any self esteem, as all the women in The L Word look the same with the one
exception of Shane, who also happens to be lacking in financial and personal success (The L
Word, 2009).

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[Figure B]
Contrary to The L Word’s over-sexualization are the woman loving twins from Canada
named Tegan and Sara, who practice a subtle form of contemporary feminism that does not
involve constantly taking off their shirts. Kate McCarthy wrote in her article titled “Not Pretty
Girls: Sexuality, Spirituality, and Gender Construction in Women’s Rock Music” that there is a
significant amount of liberation in being able to take gender prescribed forms of expression and
use them interchangeably. Tegan and Sara are one of the few bands that do not have music
videos or concerts where they are dressed overly provocatively, unlike virtually all other female
musicians in the US music scene today. Tegan and Sara dress like hipsters and come across as
ambiguous, but not to the point where they no longer look feminine. Their quirky style seems to
reiterate their own queer identity and allows their fans to engage in the feminist form of
expression that allows all genders a degree of interchangeability (McCarthy 2006, 71-76).
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Underlying messages portrayed in The L Word
Lesbians who agree with the
statement given.

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As McCarthy goes on to talk about the changing content of women’s songs and how they
have morphed over time (going from being all about the yearning for a man to political issues
and women’s rights) there seems to be an almost complete reversal in the progression of Tegan
and Sara albums. Their first album “Under Feet Like Ours” in 1999 showcased songs about the
future, analogies of deforestation and androcentrism, the freedom to be oneself, and the freedom
to raise one’s voice (Quin, 2009). By 2013 their latest album “Heartthrob” consists of song after
song about love, with one potentially not love-struck song out of the twelve on the album. All
but another one of the songs even leave out pronouns or any indication they are singing about
women, so if a person did not already know they are gay they wouldn’t find out until watching
the same sex couples which fill their music videos or looking up their old music and biography.
Even the one song that does imply their lust for women only does so by talking about where their
significant other has left their makeup, which could be interpreted as being male or female.
When the small sample was asked what they thought Tegan and Sara songs were about the ones
who had listened to their music mostly said they sing about sexual or personal relationships (as
shown in Figure C) even though a good majority of their songs on previous albums actually sing
about social issues (Quin, 2013).

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[Figure C]
In a quote taken from McCarthy’s article, feminist Camille Paglia says that ‘‘feminists
should be concerned about the personalities in rock and roll because they will be the primary
means by which young women get the feminist message’’(Paglia 2006, 72). If the women who
are perceived to be most progressive and influential in the women’s movement are only singing
love songs, it is obvious the message being sent to the general public is that women still need
lovers to be complete, no matter how forward thinking they are. The message is that they may be
lesbians but they still conform to the essentialist notion that women inherently dream of wedding
dresses and pink hearts. In addition to this there is another message which inadvertently says that
in order to make it big in the music industry women have to either appeal to men in a sexual
way, or at very least their content must fit within the confines of the hegemonic heteronormative
way of life (McCarthy 2006, 70-74).
Contemporary lesbians seem to be passively accepting their lifestyle being appropriated
into mainstream culture, as they are just happy to finally be represented at all, but the media still
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What are Tegan and Sara songs about?
Lesbian Woman
Gay Man
Bisexual Man
Bisexual Woman
Straight Woman
Straight Man

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has a long way to go when it comes to an appropriate representation of lesbian subculture -
without the underlying androcentrism and heteronormative ideals seeping through (Graf, 2014).
At this point it would seem that according to mainstream media, in order to be a lesbian one must
be a white female, as most lesbians in pop culture happen to be white women. Media procured
lesbianism is also synonymous with being obsessed with love and sex, as seen in entertainment
magazines or The L Word, and heard through artists like Tegan and Sara. What’s worse is that
lesbians are shown to portray themselves as objects of the male gaze, even though women are
their preferred partners. None of these are accurate portrayals of lesbians in the real world. There
are plenty of different races, sexes, interests, and desires that play into the diversity within the
lesbian subculture of the United States; none of which should be condemned to follow
heteronormative ideas (Hammond, 2014).

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References
Halem, Jessica
2014 How Ellen DeGeneres Helped Change the Conversation About Gays. National Public
Radio: All Things Considered.
Hammond, Joyce
2014 Sex, Gender and Sexuality (classroom lectures, WWU, Bellinghm, WA, January
February 2014).
Lee, Pei-Wen, and Michaela Meyer
2010 We All Have Feelings For Our Girlfriends: Progressive (?) Representations of Lesbian
Lives on The L Word. Sexuality and Culture 14: 234-250. DOI:
10.1007/s12119-010-9073y.
Levitt, Heidi and Katherine Hiestand
2005 Gender Within Lesbian Sexuality: Butch And Femme Perspectives. Journal of
Constructivist Psychology 18: 39-51. DOI: 10.1080/10720530590523062.
London, Stacey and Clinton Kelly
2003-2013 What Not to Wear. TV. TLC. New York.
McCarthy, Kate
2006 Not Pretty Girls?: Sexuality, Spirituality, and Gender Construction in Women’s Rock
Music. Journal of Popular Culture 39 (1): 69-94. DOI:10.1111/j.15405931.2006.00204.x.
Neary, Lynn
2014 How Ellen DeGeneres Helped Change the Conversation About Gays. National Public
Radio: All Things Considered.
Paglia, Camile
2006 Not Pretty Girls?: Sexuality, Spirituality, and Gender Construction in Women’s Rock
Music. Journal of Popular Culture 39 (1): 69-94. DOI:10.1111/j.15405931.2006.00204.x.
Quin, Tegan and Sara Quin
1999-2013 Under Feet Like Ours – Heartthrob. California: Warner Brothers.
The L Word
2004-2009 Ilene Chaiken, drs. Showtime. Los Angeles.

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Survey Questions
What is your gender identity?
● Man
● Woman
● Neither
● Both
What is your sexual orientation?
● Into Women
● Into Men
● Into any
● Not into either
Do you enjoy listening to Tegan and Sara?
● Yes
● No
● Sometimes
What do you believe most Tegan and Sara songs are about?
(Choose all that apply)
● Sexual or personal relationships
● Being a woman in contemporary society
● Being a lesbian in contemporary society
● Lesbian rights
● Women’s rights
● All of the above
● None of the above
● I do not listen to their music/not sure
● Other, please specify (text box made available)
Have you ever watched The L Word?
● Yes
● No
● Maybe once or twice

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Would you consider any of these to be underlying messages or themes from The L Word?
(Choose all that apply)
● Most lesbians have a decent amount of money
● Most lesbians practice self segregation, but do not necessarily hold prejudices toward
other races or ethnicities
● Most lesbians cheat on one another at some point in time
● Sex is a very important part of any lesbian relationship
● Lesbians must be thin to be attractive
● All lesbians are interconnected through a network of sexual relationships and partners
● All of the above
● None of the above
● I do not watch The L Word/not sure
● Other, please specify (text box made available)
Do you follow Ellen DeGeneres’s personal life?
● Yes, obsessively
● Not really
● Not if I can help it
What do you think Ellen stands for?
(Choose all that apply)
● Lesbian rights
● Women’s rights
● Just herself
● Butch lesbians
● Nothing in particular
● Not sure
● Other, please specify (text box made available)
In your opinion do you consider most women who like women to be very sexually active?
● Text response
Do you think it is common knowledge that women who like women have a hard time staying
in a monogamous relationship?
● Text response

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Why do you think many women who like women enjoy listening to Tegan and Sara?
● Text response
Do you think it is easy to “spot a lesbian”?
● Text response