The New Gay for Pay: The Sexual Politics of American Television Production by Julia Himberg (review)

From Will & Grace to Glee, GLTB representations on television have increased dramatically. As representations have changed, so too has the sociopolitical context of GLTB policy in the United States. These rapid sociopolitical changes have long been attributed to the belief that GLBT representations on television transform both cultural opinions and policymaking. Meanwhile, scholars have critiqued media for utilizing GLBT representations for mere monetary gain. From within this tension, Julia Himberg writes The New Gay for Pay: The Sexual Politics of American Television Production, contending that GLBT representations in "the U.S. television industry acts broadly as an intermediary of an interpretive space between the co-optation and the facilitation of LGBT politics" (13). Concerned not with the effects of GLBT representations themselves, Himberg's work is an important exploration of how industry workers, executives, and GLBT advocacy organizations co-create sexuality through television. Mixing methods of critical cultural studies, interview, participant observation and textual analysis, Himberg asks the reader to go beyond mere critique: the production of sexuality on television is more complex than one might imagine.

The book is divided in four parts, focusing on themes of visibility, advocacy, diversity, and equality. Himberg takes time in the introduction to establish the context from which she writes. Recently, there has been a shift to "postgay" discourse within television representations, where discourses have moved beyond coming out to center discourses where a character "just happens to be gay" (8). Of course, "post-gay rhetoric is tied up with a host of worrisome implications" (9); namely, a homonormative project of GLTB assimilation into U.S. neoliberalism. Himberg advances that "power operates on multiple levels of industry practices," where her "goal is to go beyond the argument that television corporations apolitically and exploitatively appeal to LGBT demographics simply for the sake of profit" (13). In essence, Himberg hopes to add nuance and complexity to existing critiques of GLBT television.

In Chapter 1, "Visibility: Lesbian Programming and the Changing Landscape of Cable Television," Himberg looks to how market research and cable network branding deploy lesbian television programming that "represented industry structures that appealed to politically progressive social values at the level of the audience, but also revealed and underscored the incongruity of producing, branding, and marketing" (18). Himberg grounds her analysis of shows like Bravo's Work Out and Showtime's The L Word in the notion of multicasting, where multicasting "represents the cable networks' desire to simultaneously target a niche audience and operate under the aegis of post-gay ideology" (49). In interviews with Bravo executive Andy Cohen and Showtime executive Robert Greenblatt, Himberg shows how these gay-identifying executives engage in postgay ideology to "reveal a politically motivated representational practice (albeit a narrow, liberal one) that relies on high-class and feminine lesbian characters to multicast to a range of audiences" (47). Through these interviews, Himberg reveals the complex negotiation of forces that create programming.

Chapter 2, "Advocacy: Hitching Activism to Modern Family's Gay Wedding," Himberg complicates singular notions about what GLBT television advocacy accomplishes. The chapter traces how two campaigns, one by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and another by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), utilized Mitch and Cam's wedding in Modern Family to advocate for marriage equality. Instead of pitting homonormative gay and lesbian politics against radical queer politics, Himberg historizes how activists help to co-create "realistic" GLTB television content. Although recognizing these "realistic" representations may not look like actual GLBT U.S. lives, Himberg advances that advocacy campaigns take advantage of popular shows like Modern Family to understand "television as a meaningful—even essential—tool to effect change" (76). In an ever-changing media and political environment, advocacy organizations use television to reach new demographics, supporters, and voters amid their lessened relevance post-Obergefell.

In Chapter 3, "Diversity: Under-the-Radar Activism and the Crafting of Sexual Identities," Himberg examines how industry...