Reforming the Patriarchy in Pawnee, Indiana
By Gina M. Sully, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Feminism, Gender, and Politics in NBC’s Parks and Recreation by Erika Engstrom ($42.95, 146
pgs.)
Abstract: Erika Engstrom’s Feminism, Gender, and Politics in NBC’s Parks and Recreation
analyzes what has been called the “most feminist show on television” through the neo-liberal
feminist lens of the series’ protagonist, Leslie Knope. Engstrom’s analysis illuminates the
strategies the series employs to normalize and celebrate liberal feminism’s values and to
demonstrate that feminism is integral to a healthy republic.
When I began to read Erika Engstrom’s Feminism, Gender, and Politics in NBC’s Parks and
Recreation, I found myself perplexed. While I had seen only a few episodes of the series, it
seemed to me that the series mocked Leslie Knope, and, by extension, her feminism. Engstrom,
however, argues that the series celebrates and normalizes Knope’s feminism, and I wondered
why her analysis and mine should be so different. So, I did what any good scholar who is looking
for a reason to procrastinate does. I binge-watched the series, attending especially carefully to the
myriad episodes Engstrom analyzes in nuanced detail.
Using the language and analytical categories of Leslie Knope’s own woman-centered liberal
feminism, Engstrom situates her discussion in the scholarly literature and considers conditions of
production as wells as audience reception. As she lays her argumentative foundation, Engstrom
establishes that a combination of prosaic story arcs, an “Everytown, U.S.A” setting (Engstrom
4), and “non-stereotypical” representations (4) of female characters combine to normalize
Knope’s feminism as “‘feminism for everyone’” (Magdalena qtd. in Engstrom 4). She concludes
that “the resulting message [of the series] is that gender equality can be and should be an implicit
aspect of everyday life, including the civic and political spheres” (Engstrom 3, emphasis mine).
The book’s structure and chapter titles gesture toward the language and analytical categories
of second-wave feminist theories and methods. In chapter 2, “Pawnee, Portrait in Patriarchy,” for
example, Engstrom scrutinizes Pawnee’s racist and sexist history. She describes some of the
murals in Pawnee’s city hall, and analogizes them to Roosevelt’s publicly funded New Deal
murals. Especially welcome is her inclusion of a link to a wiki where the murals are displayed.
Engstrom argues that the murals do not merely represent Pawnee’s historical past, but instead
represent “patriarchy’s mindset” (36). Acknowledging communal laughter’s bonding power, she
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