Interview: Liz Funk, author of ‘Supergirls Speak Out’

Liz Funk, the author of Supergirls Speak Out: Inside the Secret Crisis of Overachieving Girls in currently on tour with her book and she’s making a stop at blue milk. Funk’s book is described as an investigative look at a generation of over-achieving girls in the United States of America, young women who believe that “in order to be happy, (they) must excel at (their) job or career, have the best grades, wear the coolest clothes, date the best-looking boy, and have the perfect body size”.

Alas, young women seemed to have thoroughly learnt that their achievements will never be enough to lift them above the peripheral assessment of their hotness.

Despite being close friends with some seriously over-achieving women myself, I’m not sure I recognise these ’supergirls’ in my own sphere. It might be cultural differences, it might more likely be generational ones ..but I seem to remember that as young women my friends and I prided ourselves on our academic and career achievements while maintaining our identities as outsiders – we kind of liked not fitting in, on being more grrl than girl. We faced our own problems continually fighting against the mainstream but until reading Funk’s work I hadn’t fully appreciated how we may have also ensured ourselves some freedoms by opting out.

I asked Liz Funk a few questions about her book…

Welcome Liz. As the writer of a feminist motherhood blog I have to wonder to what degree parents play a part in this ’supergirl’ syndrome you’re describing? To what degree is ‘hothousing’ (ie. intensively priming gifted/talented children) or even overly identifying with your children’s achievements responsible for this experience, do you think?

What surprised me as I was researching this book is that most young women and girls did not see their parents as sources of pressure!  Most girls told me, “No way, my mom’s my best friend!” and saw their parents as sources of support.  And most parents I talked with about this phenomenon were positively baffled by their high-stress, self-flagellating daughters.

Ugh, I hate the idea of hothousing.  While I think that it’s great to encourage talented children, I hate the industry of trying to cultivate gifted kids.  Anecdotally, I remember in elementary school that everyone hated the kids in the talented and gifted program because it was such a formal segregation of “smart kids” and “not-smart kids.”  What’s good about high school is that everyone gets props for trying to be smart, but there’s less formal distinctions between who is naturally smart and who just tries really, really hard.

In the world of motherhood I assume ‘Supergirls’ go on to be fairly prone to becoming the ‘yummy mummy’ set when they have children – a trend known for its dedication to fashion and image, its determination to maintain sex appeal, its reputation for ‘alpha’ or perfect parenting, its drive to keep up with or even create parenting vogues, and its divisiveness among other mothers. The Yummy Mummy phenomenon is probably the result of media and marketing campaigns aimed at encouraging consumerism and agitating insecurity about female powerlessness, to what degree does this also reflect the reality of ‘Supergirls’?

I think that while moms can tell their daughters to love their bodies and to feel good the way they are, girls are more likely to mimic the behavior of their mothers (rather than do what they say, especially if there are two different ideologies at hand).  If a mom is putting a ton of effort into how she looks—dressing sexy, getting Botox, always having her act together—girls are definitely going to emulate that!

I couldn’t help but be struck by the way in which you describe ‘Supergirls’ in your book as being driven to achieve not particularly by a passion for their pursuits but by a need for constant recognition and acknowledgement. What caused this hunger in self, do you think? And do you believe it is uniquely female or do young men also get caught up in it?

I think that the vast majority of girls who sign up for six honors classes in high school or have a double-major and a double-minor in an honors college often aren’t trying to quench some thirst for knowledge—they are trying to feel valuable and feel important through being constantly busy!  They feel like they’re not inherently impressive or worthy of attention… they need to prove to others that they are impressive and interesting. I think it’s a uniquely female thing, sadly.  I think that while boys are under pressure to get into a good college, that’s it.  They achieve in school to get into a good college—they’re not looking to justify why they matter by working hard and pleasing others, because they know that they inherently matter.

While you describe ‘Supergirls’ as being from every walk of life the anecdotes in your work certainly lead to a picture of a privileged group of young women – they meet mainstream definitions of beauty, they attend colleges, vigorously consume labels and seem to have high disposable incomes.. why should we care about the problems these women face when there are so many problems facing young women with less privilege?

I do maintain that the Supergirl issue affects girls from all walks of life.  I think the privilege issue is actually just another facet where the Supergirl dilemma is so deceptive.  Many of the girls who I interviewed (including some of the “main characters”) were from low-income families, but I think that they worked really hard to “look rich,” making sure that they had the same clothes, technological gadgets, and outward appearance of wealth that girls who were actually raised with more money had.  So much of the pressure of Supergirl dilemma is to find yourself in stuff, and I think that girls of all social classes want to validate themselves with designer goods and fancy things.  I think there’s actually more pressure on low-income girls, because in addition to having to get into a good college to meet the expectations of their communities, they have to figure out how to pay for it!

Many of the difficulties facing ‘Supergirls’ seems to be the inevitable trade-offs that come with the ‘power’ of sexual objectification (eg. the need to be non-threatening to men, one’s power of attractiveness being decided by a male viewer, the fickle nature of that power etc) – this is a common experience for women, particularly young women. Unfortunately it seems from your book that ‘Supergirls’ rarely challenge this – even with their higher status they are more likely to be complicit in these patriarchal constructs than trying to dismantle them, lest they risk the punishment of rejection, is that the case?

Ah, this is such an important topic, and you said it best!  I think that many Supergirls want validation so badly that they’re willing to ignore their own values (and sometimes their common sense!) to win the approval of their peers and their communities.  It’s such a hard situation, because these girls who are so intellectual and who seem so self-assured by day get wasted at fraternity parties and grungy bars by night, and they think that by giggling and posing for provocative pictures, they’re also living up to the female ideal (and frankly, they’re right!).  The social rules are so patriarchal, and while I think that most Supergirls are intellectually (and subconsciously) aware of this, they’re not about to challenge it, because they’ve taught to be amenable and people-pleasing and to follow the rules of their communities!

It’s interesting: many girls who I talked to identified with feminist values, but didn’t want to explicitly say that they were feminists, and I think this was largely out of fear for social repercussions.  Anecdotally, I struggled to find that balance between wanting people to think I was a “good girl” and standing up for feminist values and encouraging people to think differently about the sexism that we accept in our daily lives simply as part of gender roles… and ultimately, I chose feminism.

I wonder, do you have any predictions about how the global financial crisis will impact on ‘Supergirls’ – a time of high unemployment and slower career progression, particularly for young graduates, combined with a time when blatant consumerism will be frowned upon. Will this liberate ‘Supergirls’ or further frustrate them in their efforts to achieve?

From the looks of youth culture in New York, you would never know that the US is in a financial crisis.  I see girls continuing to buy $30 hair conditioner and new cell phones because there’s a newer, cooler model available.  When it’s time to find a job, that’s another story.  I see a lot of students taking precautions, like adding a more practical second major to their college curriculum and taking on a second internship to network more… and I think that Supergirls may overextend themselves even more in wanting to prepare themselves for this tricky job market.  But maybe the Supergirls need a buyout, too!  Maybe it’s time to admit that things have gone too far for us Supergirls, and we need to put our lives on hold and ask our families and friends and therapists and society to help us find a healthy place of achieving and consuming and self-motivating.  But the good thing is, the Supergirl buyout doesn’t require taxpayer money!

You can see more from Funk’s book tour at the TODAY Show and The Washington Post, and her virtual tour of blogs here.