Becoming Plastic: Don't Hate Me Because I'm Mean

Maria Robinson-Cseke

Maria Robinson-Cseke University of Alberta

Abstract

This paper platforms the popular film, Mean Girls (Michaels & Waters, 2004), to demonstrate how construction of the subject takes place. Deleuzeâ€™s political courses of molar, molecular, and lines of flight are used to explore subjectivity through his concept of becoming. How a product of visual culture can be used to explore the subjectivity of adolescent females is demonstrated as the film characters enter continuous states and stages of becoming animal, monster, and woman. The idea of a self that is a shifting identity, influenced by body, mind, and affective response, is defined by Deleuzeâ€™s Body without Organs. The Body without Organs is guided by desire and, in fact, is desire. This desire is revealed through meanness. Becoming mean is explored, as an additional stage of becoming that can be particularly visible with girls, in the micro-society of the school.

Author Biography

Maria Robinson-Cseke, University of Alberta

Maria Robinson-Cseke is currently a doctoral student in art education at the University of Alberta. Her research interests include artist/teacher post-identity, art teacher education, visual culture, and arts-based research. Maria spent fifteen years as a visual art teacher in the high school setting and is currently teaching at the Faculty of Education, University fo Ottawa, Canada. Correspondence regarding this article should be addressed to this author at cseke@rogers.com.