Homeland and neoliberalism: text,paratexts and treatment of affective labor

This essay examines Showtime’s television program Homeland, along with several examples of what Jonathan Gray calls paratexts, arguing that meanings produced through the intersection of text and paratexts create a preferred interpretation of the show’s main character, Carrie Mathison, which aligns with neoliberal and post-feminist ideologies surrounding affective labor. Using textual cartography to map meanings, I locate a preferred interpretation of Homeland that recognizes the instrumental value of affective labor while writing off the deleterious effects as individualized personal issues. This read supports a neoliberal, post-feminist interpretation of Carrie as a pathologically flawed individual woman inept at emotional self-management.