IT'S A QUEER OLE YEAR:TV
SHOWS TO WATCH IN 2018
BY ISOBEL MOORE
BY JESSICA BROADBENT
BY JESSICA BROADBENT
LESBIANS: GOING BEYOND
THE QUIBBLES
BY CHESKA HARDIE
BY BILLY WELSBY
BY BILLY WELSBY
BY ISOBEL MOORE & BILLY WELSBY
BY ISOBEL MOORE & BILLY WELSBY
BY CHESKA HARDIE
BY ISOBEL MOORE
BY ELLA JELLYMAN
BY HANNAH PARR
From dark and gloomy goths, androgynous queens, to club, fluid and pageant queens, it is clear that the varieties and possibilities are broadening for what drag can be. It seems as though the experiential possibilities for Drag Queens are never-ending. In the 21stcentury, individuals have the opportunity to express themselves however they please. Drag culture is bigger and more popular than ever before. Although drag has only recently had the limelight within the past few decades, the book Drag Diaries (David, 1995), believes that drag/cross dressing, has widely been documented in great civilisations from the past, which include the Aztecs and Egyptians. So, drag has in fact had involvement in our culture for centuries, with every part and form being fundamental for the success of drag today.
Most familiar to today’s millennial and Generation Z consumer, RuPaul’s reality show, RuPaul’s Drag Race, has assisted into bringing drag queens further into the mainstream consciousness. Ru herself, once told ABC News (2016), that she thought Drag Race could never go mainstream. However, according to Vice (2017), the show has done quite the opposite, as Vice indicates that RuPaul has made drag mainstream.
Whilst there are many types and styles of drag, it is exciting to learn and reveal whether age has an extensive effect within the drag community.
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Since 2009, Drag Race has been airing on television worldwide. It has brought together Drag Queens of all diversities, and has broken the boundaries of what drag can be and who it can communicate to.
Sharon Needles, who first appeared in Drag Race in 2011, is one of the world’s most famous drag queens. Being the age of 36, Sharon had a rough time growing up in her childhood, where she had to deal with anti-gay views on a daily basis. However, Sharon’s confidence in expressing herself has stimulated a new generation to be encouraged and reinvent themselves. Sharon is not the typical ‘feminine’ drag look that people expect to see with drag queens. Her look is more experimental and it has pushed the boundaries of what drag can be.
In contrast, it can be seen that other drag stars can have almost the opposite rise to fame that many queens experience after they have competed on drag race. Queens such as 22-year-old Aquaria have managed to use the shows influence in pop culture to establish themselves as somewhat local stars even at a young age. Already headlining events across New York and being featured in magazines such as Vogue Italia, it was the show’s producers that contacted her, asking Aquaria to compete as soon as she was legally old enough.
Drag queens are now being embraced nationwide, on national stages, include the Emmy’s, which means that there is more space for drag in popular culture than ever before (Billboard, 2017). From drag once being only expressed live underground, to now being classed as mainstream (Vogue, 2018), it is clear that gender is increasingly becoming a thing of the past, and drag will continue to blossom and break the boundaries.