English 1102: Television and Feminism

Dr. Casey Alane Wilson • Georgia Institute of Technology

Tag: women (Page 2 of 2)

Career Representation in TV Over Time – Annotated Bibliography

Elasmar, Michael, Kazumi Hasegawa, and Mary Brain. “The Portrayal of Women in U.S. Prime Time Television.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, vol. 43, no. 1, 1999, pp. 20-34. ProQuest, http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/227281152?accountid=11107.

This paper mainly focuses on how women are portrayed and how that affects children watching it. It illustrates how previous researchers only tracked the presence of women and that the portrayal of women is what really matters. The article also recognized how men were over represented on television with 58% having professional roles compared to 15% in real life. Women were more likely to have non-serious roles than men. They found that only 44% of women were depicted as working and only 21% of married women were depicted as working. This research paper is important because it focuses on a time period outside of modern television. This helps our topic a lot since it is the portrayal of working women over time. It is further important since it is full of statistics that help illustrate the differences between women and men in prime-time television. It is worth reading to understand the difference of working women in the 70s and today.

Grodin, Debra. “Women Watching Television: Gender, Class, and Generation in the American Television Experience.” Women and Language, vol. 14, no. 2, 1991, pp. 35. ProQuest, http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/198799896?accountid=11107.

This paper analyzes another paper over how and why working women are portrayed the way they are on television. It goes over how women like to identify with certain types of characters over others. This paper goes into further detail on how middle-class women dislike watching women with high paying careers because it is very different from their own lives. It notes how shows with female characters similar to an average middle-class women are more likely to be watched and enjoyed and enjoyed by their average female viewer. This source is importance since it goes into why shows mainly depict middle-class women working normal medium paying jobs or as stay-at-home moms. It does not contain lots of statistics and data on working women in television, but it gives good insight into what types of characters women are most likely to identify and relate too. It will be important to relate the ideas of this article to data and statistics from other articles.

Glascock, Jack, and Thomas E. Ruggiero. “Representations of Class and Gender on Primetime Spanish-Language Television in the United States.” Communication Quarterly, vol. 52, no. 4, 2004, pp. 390-402. ProQuest, http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/216482966?accountid=11107.

This article goes over class and gender in Spanish-speaking television in the United States. It argues that men are more likely to have higher paying jobs and less childcare responsibilities than women. The paper further argues that lighter skinned characters were more likely to be in a higher class and better position than darker skinned characters. While women were represented equally to men in the shows analyzed, they were less likely to have jobs and even less likely to have higher paying jobs than men. This paper is very important because it relates directly to our topic and focuses on a different subset of American television and viewers. It illustrates that even in Latino television, women are still unequal to men in the roles they play on television. Men are still more likely to be the providers for the household and most women are either stay at home moms or work low paying jobs. Overall, this source is worth reading in understanding the gender differences in a different subset of American television.

Ulaby, Neda. “Working Women On Television: A Mixed Bag At Best.” npr, 18 May 2018, https://www.npr.org/2013/05/18/184832930/working-women-on-television-a-mixed-bag-at-best.

This article goes over careers in characters in prime-time television and compares the statistics to real life statistics. They use statistics from a research Geena Davis’s study. They found that 44.3% of women in speaking roles were gainfully employed on television. The article compares this to the real life percent of 46.7% and decided that prime-time television is pretty decent at depicting women with careers. However, the paper points out that television is not accurate in age and children in working women. Almost none of working women in television have children and most are under 40. This article is important because it goes over important statistics that relate to our topic. It is very important in comparing the statistics from television to real life to see if television is accurately portraying its characters. The article is definitely worth reading as it gives insight on how accurate the portrayal of female characters are in prime-time television.

Smith, Brittany, “Gender Representation and Occupational Portrayals in Primetime Television” (2016). Theses and Dissertations. 1673. http://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd/1673

This study looked at gender representation and occupational portrayals on primetime television. The paper looks at lots of statistics and compares them to previous studies. While there has been improvement, the portrayal of women is not where it should be and lots of stereotypes of women still exist in television. This paper also looked into which stations had made the most improvement, and which stations had made the least. The study found that there still needs to be lots of improvement to get these shows up to par with reality as lots of women are still portrayed as housewives or blue-collared workers. This study is important because it contains lots of statistics of different news stations that relate directly to our topic of working women in television, and it relates the statistics to previous studies to show the change in recent years. It provides lots of insight on which areas need improvement the most and on what stations.

Emilaire, Sierra. “A Look At Women Represented In Media.” StudyBreak. 17 July 2017, https://studybreaks.com/culture/women-representation-media/

This article takes a look at how women are portrayed in television and how that relates to young girls’ lives. It states that stereotypes that come from TV shows like women are supposed to be housewives and that women cannot become CEOs puts limitations on girls growing up. This piece explains how representation is important because women shape their perceptions of themselves based on what they see in Television and movies. This article states how there is not enough female characters with high-paying jobs or leads in shows. This article is important because it illustrates the importance of having accurate depictions of women in society and the effect it can have on young girls growing up. It is definitely worth reading to understand the effect having different portrayals of women can have on society and individual people. This article also explains how women in these roles in television are already accepted and liked and should appear more often.

r e s e a r c h

Medich, Rob et al. “Flashes.” Entertainment Weekly, no. 678, 2002, p. 16,

 

This article from Entertainment Weekly breaks down some occupations shown on TV. It compares the prominence of these occupations to the composition of those occupations in real life. A notable comparison comes in the medical field, where 12.1% of the surveyed television characters are employed in the medical field, despite only 0.9% of people work in this field in real life. Additionally, only 6.4% of sampled characters work in management or executive positions, despite 31% of real people working in these positions. None of the metrics for included fields in fantasy versus reality are anywhere near one another.

Despite the shortness of this article, it serves to illustrate good points relative to the topic at hand. Television presents scenarios that are not lifelike so that people can live vicariously through it. In this instance, the life of a medical employee is something not many people experience. However, this also shows that implicit bias may have a hand in altering the reality of television. While these data may not be directly applicable to the research question, this does show the disparity between reality and fiction in television.

 

Durkin, Kevin and Bradley Nugent. “Kindergarten Children’s Gender-Role Expectations for Television Actors.” Sex Roles., vol. 38, no. 6, 1998, pp. 387-402,

 

This article begins with an exposition of gender roles defined in television, with men holding more typically masculine roles and women holding more traditionally feminine ones. Previous studies have attempted to form a correlation between this and children’s perception of gender roles, with varying and sometimes contradictory results. A study is then detailed, in which children’s tendency to assign gender to certain jobs was assessed. Children aged four to five were asked to watch a scene with a female voiceover, featuring equal numbers of male and female characters, if any, and identify if a man, woman, or both would be suitable for performing a given action. The children were also asked whether or not they thought they would be good at said task later in life. The children’s response to the first task was very clearly in favor of the predetermined typical gender roles. Whether or not this was due to television was not addressed.

This article illustrates some of the importance, or lack thereof, of the issue at hand. While gender stereotyping may exist in television, it may not have any large effects on children. However, children do end up with biases somehow, and this may be the result of television. The use of a female voiceover in this study is interesting, and may cause skewed results, but the data is already pretty clear and unified, so I doubt it.

 

Greenberg, Bradley S. and Larry Collette. “The Changing Faces on Tv: A Demographic Analysis of Network Television’s New Seasons, 1966-1992.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media., vol. 41, no. 1, 1997, pp. 1-13,

 

This article goes through a very thorough scrutinization of new characters in television shows over twenty-seven years, from 1966 to 1992. 88% of characters in this time period were white, with only thirteen total Hispanic and twelve total Asian characters. It was found that on average, characters were 65% male and 35% female, with the closest to real ratio of male to female being 49% female in 1984. Characters were never even or majority female. Females’ appearances on television were, on average, ten years younger than males, assigned to more stereotypical roles, fewer in number, and more likely to be supporting characters. Additionally, females were most likely to hold the position of married mother at home. As far as occupations are concerned, 17% of females represented “professional” careers, as opposed to men, of whom 27% held such roles. Males were up to five times more likely than females to hold salesperson positions, and females were found to be four times as likely as men to be domestics or homemakers.

This article holds some pretty damning evidence. While I’m sure there has been a lot of progress regarding representation in television since 1992 and certainly since 1966, this article definitely details this as a large problem. The fact that gender alone of characters is so skewed, in addition to the huge disparity in jobs held by the sexes, is honestly disturbing. This is right along the path that our research question takes, and it paints a picture similar to the on we had in mind initially- that women were and are underrepresented and misrepresented occupation-wise in television. This really makes me wonder why such a thing manifests so blatantly in television.

 

Farrington, Jan. “Jobs on Tv.” Career World, vol. 27, no. 6, 1999, pp. 6-12,

 

This magazine article takes an interesting stance on the issue at hand. The author proposes that in the world of television, it is common for people to achieve more than in real life, including career-wise. Additionally, she alleges that minorities hold more diverse jobs in television. However, she touches on the fact that practically only office jobs, law and justice work, and medical field jobs are portrayed on television. The author also comments on how television is significantly differentiable from reality, but that’s for a good reason, as television is meant to be a break away from one’s reality.

I am skeptical of much of the claims the author makes in this article. She alleges that television is a world where people are represented in a better light than in reality, when the exact opposite is proposed in the previous article- specifically that women and minorities are severely underrepresented in television. The author does bring up an important point, though. Television is meant to be different from reality, as it is a form of entertainment. But this begs the question: when is is okay to deviate from reality and when is that unacceptable? Certainly having an overwhelming majority of characters in television being male is detrimental in some way, and conforming to gender stereotypes is definitely not a good thing either.

 

Smith, Stacy L et al. “Assessing Gender-Related Portrayals in Top-Grossing G-Rated Films.” Sex Roles., vol. 62, no. 11-12, 2010, pp. 774-786, doi:10.1007/s11199-009-9736-z.

 

This article explores the roles of characters in G-rated movies and how these roles relate to the gender of the character. It details the ratio of female leads to males, one to about two and a half, and the traits that female characters possess. Females tended to have more “good” traits than males and they were more traditionally attractive. Additionally, most characters were white. Females were much more likely than males to be in a relationship and be a parent. However, occupations of characters were not found to be related to gender, except for military occupations, in which males held more.

While not directly addressing television, this is a closely related body of work. This report relates to the first article recorded above, in which children identified gender roles in certain tasks. This article exposes a very important piece of information for our purposes- G-rated movies don’t end up discriminating occupation by gender as much as television may. This is interesting, since jobs on television do exhibit gender discrimination. However, total gender and race disparities remain.

 

Signorielli, Nancy. ” Aging on Television: Messages Relating to Gender, Race, and Occupation in Prime Time.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, vol. 48, no. 2, 2004, pp. 279-301, doi:10.1207/s15506878jobem4802_7.

 

This article scrutinizes many facets of older characters in television, including gender, race, and occupation. It finds that in general, older characters are underrepresented. Additionally, it shows that while younger characters typically held more “prestigious” jobs than their older counterparts, among older characters, men typically held more “prestigious” jobs than women, and whites held more “prestigious” jobs than minorities. The author then discusses the findings through the lens of role modeling. The fact that fewer older people exist in prestigious positions in television contributes to a lack of role models in young people.

This article deals with older characters and how these characters are represented in television. It contains some information applicable to our research in that it explores occupation and gender of these characters. The article, like the rest of our research, basically states that being old, being a woman, and being a minority are all ways to identify that a character on television is less likely to have a good job. Furthermore, I definitely agree with this author’s comment on the lack of older role models in television, as it is exactly what makes this research important. This under-representation may lead children to believe that they are doomed to less important jobs as they grow older.

Career Representation in TV Over Time (Bibliography)!

Looks like indentations aren’t working! Oh well…

Source 1 (Peer Reviewed):

Atkin, David J., Jay Moorman, and Carolyn A. Lin. “Ready for Prime Time: Network Series Devoted to Working Women in the 1980s.” Sex Roles, vol. 25, no.11-12, 1991, pp. 677-684.  Springer Open Choice, https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007%2FBF00289571.pdf

This research paper contains the findings of an analysis of shows from the 1980s, a period recognized for a large increase in the depiction of the “working woman.” The study focuses solely on shows where the lead is an employed woman, including “Roseanne,” and “Murphy Brown.” The study reveals certain interesting findings, such as that most employed women characters were also not depicted as married, or that most working women were still under the direct authority of a male executive. The ending analysis also attributes this boost in working women, not to the progressiveness of the networks, but rather the need for networks to compete with one another after the initial success of certain women-centered shows from the late 1970s. In our research, the data we collect should reflect this boost in employed women characters. Thus, this source is valuable because it provides an explanation for this influx, and we will be able to see if this trend persisted to the same degree in later decades.

 

Source 2:

Dixon-Smith, Matilda. “Why It’s Still Revolutionary To Watch Women Work On TV.” Junkee, 29 July 2017, http://junkee.com/tv-women-working-shows/114239.

This article by Junkee Media elaborates on the current working women of today’s television. It also describes some of the female characters and shows that are regarded as milestones in the pure representation of “the career woman,” which broke the previous mold of women being caretakers or constantly pursuing love interests. The piece also discusses setbacks in this progress of representation, which surprisingly includes shows with a majority female cast. Lastly, the article discusses the importance of proper representation of “the career woman” on television, as it influences how real working women are perceived and acted upon by society. This paper will be valuable to our research because it justifies the importance of our topic and why our research is necessary for discussion. It will also be interesting to see if the shows that are considered milestones for representation appear in our list of popular shows to analyze. This will indicate if they were widely accepted by society or not.

 

Source 3 (Peer Reviewed):

Dozier, David, Nora Horan, and Martha M. Lauzen. “Constructing Gender Stereotypes Through Social Roles in Prime-Time Television” Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, vol. 52, no. 2, 2008, pp. 200-212. Taylor & Francis Online, https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08838150801991971, doi:https://doi.org/10.1080/08838150801991971.

This paper analyzes the varying nature of roles of characters of popular recent primetime television shows between 2005 and 2006. In particular, the research seeks to determine the relationship between gender and the type of role played: “interpersonal” or “work-related.” The study found that interpersonal roles (those involving relationships or care) were typically played by men, while work roles are dominated by men, thus perpetuating the long-standing stereotype set by past years. However, the study also found that shows with more women writers reduce the gap by having a more equal proportion of men and women playing interpersonal roles. In contrast, shows with all men writers feature a more equal proportion of men and women playing work roles. This study will be important to understand influences on the data we collect related to women employment, as this study shows that the presence of employed women characters can be affected by the number of male writers for the show.

 

Source 4:

Lauzen, Martha M. “Boxed In 2017-18: Women On Screen and Behind the Scenes in Television.” San Diego State University, Sep 2018, https://womenintvfilm.sdsu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/2017-18_Boxed_In_Report.pdf.

This research paper from San Diego State University is a large list of findings that resulted from an analysis of over two decades worth of prime-time television. The paper covers nearly every aspect of women’s representation in television, ranging from employment in the show’s production to on-screen appearances. The paper even distinguishes findings between various sources of television, such as broadcast TV, cable, and streaming. The paper is valuable because it presents information in a very easy to read format, making it easy to see how women’s representation in television has changed. The findings also contain highly relevant findings regarding the presence of employed women in television in comparison to men. Though the paper does not get too specific, it provides a good general indication of the current presence of employed women versus their male counterparts. The most promising aspect of this paper is that it is a very recent source, published in September 2018. This means that the data contained is the most accurate out of all the sources thus far.

Source 5 (Peer Reviewed):

Olson, Beth, and William Douglas. “The Family on Television: Evaluation of Gender Roles in Situation Comedy.” Sex Roles, vol. 36, no. 5, 1997, pp. 409-427. ProQuest, http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/225376065?accountid=11107.

This research paper is a statistical analysis of the themes that appeared in popular family-centric television, and the character tropes that appeared along with those themes. The paper also changes how these themes and character tropes evolved over time (starting from the debut of popular television in the 1950s), explaining the introduction of some new ideas and the descent of once popular themes. This source is valuable to our research because it is the only one to focus solely on family shows. This is critical, given that women characters have often been depicted in the context of being a family caregiver over being employed. The research also assesses the degree to which audiences considered the female character to be equivalent in terms of gender roles. The study found that newer (note that shows considered “newer” were aired in the early 1990s) demonstrated higher levels of equality. This could be another interesting parameter to measure in our research.

 

Source 6 (Peer Reviewed):

Stout, Jane G., Victoria A. Grunberg, and Tiffany A. Ito. “Gender Roles and Stereotypes about Science Careers Help Explain Women and Men’s Science Pursuits.” Sex Roles, vol. 75, no. 9-10, 2016, pp. 490-499. ProQuest, http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/1840619357?accountid=11107, doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11199-016-0647-5.

This research study examines the relationship between the stereotypes associated with genders and STEM careers, and how they relate to real-world participation in STEM careers. Most of the research centers on the overwhelming majority of men with a formal STEM education in comparison to women, but it does indicate some increase in women participation in recent years. The study focuses mostly on genders but also factors in minority participation/stereotypes. The paper also addresses the source of the stereotypes that cause this real-life disparity, stating that a large contributing factor is the media’s depiction of people in STEM career fields. Therefore, this source will be useful in understanding the low percentage of female television characters with careers in STEM fields, which has almost always been depicted as being dominated by men. This also emphasizes an important aspect of our research topic: whether media influences reality, the opposite, or if there is a cyclical influence.

Female Representation in the News or Lack Thereof

Cochran, B. (2011). WOMEN’S ROLE IN MEDIA: BUILDING TOWARD AN EQUITABLE FUTURE. Medijske Studije = Media Studies, 2(3), 94-99. Retrieved from http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/1954227223?accountid=11107

Cochran celebrates the progress that women have made in the media but also stresses the need for improvement for women in media on both the national and international stage. She gathers statistics and presents them in order to support these claims of progress and necessity for improvement. The value of this article lies in its concentration on the advancement of women in the media through showcasing examples of fair representation of women in the media Additionally, the presentation of precise paths through which women can advance their role within the news as well as ways the companies should be facilitating this growth is very worthwhile. Although this source does not contain a specific study, it contains firsthand accounts of Cochran’s experience of being part of the International Women’s Media Foundation from the beginning which has likely expanded her viewpoint and enabled her to give insight into the media’s representation of women in other countries which enriches the conversation of media coverage in the United States through facilitating comparisons between the two.

Desmond, R., & Danilewicz, A. (2010). Women are on, but not in, the news: Gender roles in local television news. Sex Roles, 62(11-12), 822-829. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11199-009-9686-5

This source aims to reveal gender bias in terms of who gets what type of stories, who gets lead stories, and who gets cited as expert sources. Desmond and Danilewicz hypothesized that in all of these aspects women would get the short stick. This source is arguably the best out of these six sources for several reasons. Desmond and Danilewicz convey the importance and implications of their study for young women: if young women only see women presenting certain types of stories, it will affirm gender roles and possibly limit these female viewers’ idea of what they are capable of. The source goes to great depth to draw comparisons between their research and past studies as well as bringing in both statistical and personable details to further ground their research in. In addition to an in depth description of the methodology, the study’s results are explained very clearly, and any hypothesis not completely supported is readily rejected. The study’s results express that female and male anchors and reporters are equally represented in terms of their numbers, but females are pigeon-holed into almost exclusively reporting stories about health and human interest whereas men get the meatier, tougher topics like politics. Additionally, male experts are more likely to be cited than females. This is a highly efficient source for depicting both the successes and failures of gender representation in local television news.

Engstrom, Erika, and Anthony J. Ferri. “From Barriers to Challenges: Career Perceptions of Women TV News Anchors.” Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, vol. 75, no. 4, 1998, pp. 789-802. ProQuest, http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/216926995?accountid=11107.

Engstrom and Ferri focus on discerning what local female anchors identify as their greatest career barriers based on a well-developed survey that received 128 responses. The article also compares the results of this 1990s survey to a similar survey conducted in the previous decade. Engstrom and Ferri conclude that the main obstacle females anchors face within their careers is the focus on their physical experience as well as the difficultly of balancing work and family life. This peer-reviewed source is valuable because it goes into great depth to establish the history of female news anchors and what they struggled with in order to compare that with what current female anchors face. The article meticulously explais how the survey was constructed and  affirms that the survey was conducted by random sampling. Additionally, the authors are very transparent in pointing out that the results cannot necessarily be generalized to the larger population due to its small sample size. Despite the small sample size, the article is beneficial in the way that it presents both the assenters and dissenters viewpoints equally, and the personal quotes given even if just anecdotal, give life and insight to how real women feel about gender representation and equality (or lack thereof) in their industry.

Grubb, M. V., & Billiot, T. (2010). Women sportscasters: Navigating a masculine domain. Journal of Gender Studies, 19(1), 87-93. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09589230903525460

This article is an assemblage of quotes and stories from a collection of interviews in order to expose the harsh, unwelcoming environment that female sportscasters much traverse in order to be a part of the field. This exposure is supposed to serve as a call to action to change the culture surrounding sports and the treatment of women. The article briefly accounts the tales of the groundbreaking women who first made a space for women in sportscasting. The value of this study cannot be found in statistics or an in-depth experiment; it is found instead in the worth of personal and genuine accounts of female sportscasters vocalizing the struggles, the mistreatment, the injustice they face on a daily basis. Because of its lack of concrete facts, this source cannot stand alone, but it definitely has the potential to be a powerful piece when paired with statistical data that proves the lack of representation of females in this industry along with a wide-spread analysis of how women sportscasters feel about their jobs. In other words, due to its anecdotal nature, all the points made in the source cannot necessarily be generalized to the entire industry, but it can make for a great supplemental piece and possibly provide a face for the facts.

Mudrick, M., Burton, L. J., Sauder, M. H., & Lin, C. A. (2018). Sportscasting success: Varying standards may apply. Journal of Sports Media, 13(1), 49-73. Retrieved from http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/2056814931?accountid=11107

The argument of this article is that female sportscasters face double-standards and are limited by gender roles that influence the audience’s perception of them. The article supports its claim by citing examples of the social role theory and then expounding on how these persistent gender roles and stereotyping specifically affect female sportscasters. The value of this article is not so much found in the actual study it conducts (analyzing comments made during a sports debate between a female and male broadcaster), but more so in its explanation of gender roles and its analysis of how they shape the way audiences think. However, one very beneficial element of the study is how it illustrates the way that viewers will comment that a man is more knowledgeable without having any examples to support that assumption. Some commentators explicitly say they find men more trustworthy in this realm which all just goes to exemplify the stagnant presence of gender typing in society. This article does well at specifying the lack of women represented in sports media along with their unique struggles. Within the article, the limitations of the study are acknowledged which strengthens its sense of reliability.

Price, C. J., & Wulff, S. S. (2005). Does sex make a difference? job satisfaction of television network news correspondents. Women’s Studies in Communication, 28(2), 207-234. Retrieved from http://prx.library.gatech.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/198297768?accountid=11107

The article makes a subdued argument of the need for “improvement of women’s roles in network television” through its quantification of the differences between job satisfaction of males and females in network television. After measurements based on several different factors (age, salary, amount of experience), the article concludes that overall women are less satisfied than men with their jobs. Despite looking for differences between males and females, the article speaks to the fact that on many aspects of the survey women and men have very similar responses. The value of this article can be found in its extensive detail of the history of the dynamic between men and women in national news networks, its multitude of references to other studies and analyses to bolster its own findings, and the statistical presentation of the data. This article is a great supplement to Engstrom and Ferri’s article because it can better highlight the significant differences between sexes in the workplace due to its comparison of both male and female responses. Although this article provides a bountiful amount of statistical data along with some qualitative material, gender representation seems to only play a minor portion.

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