"Bad GirlsChanged My Life": Homonormativity in a Women's Prison Drama

This paper explores representations of sexuality in a popular British television drama. The author argues that the program in question, Bad Girls, a drama set in a women's prison, conveys a set of values that are homonormative. In other words, unlike other mainstream television products that may have lesbian or gay characters within a prevailing context of heteronormativity, BG represents lesbian sexuality as normal, desirable, and possible. At the same time, BG reproduces dominant understandings of social relations in other areas, particularly around race. The broader significance of the series lies in its impact on viewers' lives, its nonconformity with dominant “gay market” images, and its significance as a space within popular culture from which meanings of gender and sexuality can be contested.