Wonder Woman for a day: Affect, agency, and Amazons

Abstract

In this paper, I consider the ways in which the feminist utopian ethos of Wonder Woman, as defined by her creator, William Marston, has been used to actualize real-life social change. Specifically, I examine fan Andy Mangels's creation of Wonder Woman Day, a charity event held annually at a Portland, Oregon, comic book store to raise funds for local domestic violence programs. I look at how an affective bond with Wonder Woman informs and guides an affective attachment to one's local and national communities, actualizing the utopian promise of self, commodity icon, and America. These utopian iterations are primarily defined by a celebration of pluralism, and thus Wonder Woman is used to validate the inherent pluralism of the self in relation to society, an empowering strategy for all consumer-citizens.