Between banjos, beaches and bending gender: Negotiating the queer rural space in Hannah Montana

Abstract

This article explores queer and non-heteronormative subtexts in connection with representations of rurality in the Disney family sitcom Hannah Montana (2006-2011). The multi-layered world, which the protagonist Hannah Montana/Miley Stewart inhabits, is shaped by sexual undercurrents closely linked to an imagined rural space. This space is constructed as the ‘sexual other’ in relation to the gender and body politics of the show’s main setting: Mailbu, California. In particular, the protagonist’s original home state of Tennessee forms a cultural repertoire in which dominant norms of gender performativity are ignored or subverted. Certain hints at queer codes and practices become identifiable when the rural space is invoked and contrasted with the perceived, sanitized ‘sexual normativity’ of Southern California. Projecting the non-normative onto the rural allows Disney to protect the show’s image as so-called wholesome family entertainment. The resulting play with queer practices, such as gender-bending and cross-dressing, is shown to connect with Disney’s attempts to queercode characters and spaces in order to facilitate the effective marketing of the show across multiple segments in an increasingly multi-sexual teen market. The role of the extratextual personae of Miley Cyrus and Billy Ray Cyrus complement this strategy, through their functioning as instructive models for ongoing negotiations of sexuality and gender among multi-generational audiences in the early twenty-first century.