Unpacking gender issues through contemporary serial drama

This contribution explores the pedagogical potential of using one scene from one serial drama to teach gender issues in a high school context. The contribution is a text-based argument with an overall media literacy approach to teaching gender issues. As pedagogical examples, we present two different series – Euphoria (HBO 2019-) and Rita (TV2/Netflix 2012-20) – through two individual video excerpts from the series. These scenes have been carefully selected to highlight how specific gender issues may be scrutinised from just one brief sequence. The scene from Euphoria provides an opportunity to analyse toxic masculinity, while the scene from Rita presents a perspective that we identify as banal gender bending. In conclusion, we highlight how this approach not only provides high school teachers with an opportune way to locate usable excerpts as teaching material; this specific approach also provides an occasion for teachers to turn the classroom around and facilitate students’ own search for usable excerpts in and creative appropriation of serial drama.