Talking Tough: Gender and Reported Speech in Campaign News Coverage

Abstract

Building on the notion of "gendered mediation," we argue that conventional news frames construct politics in stereotypically masculine terms, and we examine the implications of these news frames for the coverage of female party leaders. Content analysis of reported speech in television news coverage of the 1993 and 1997 Canadian elections, combined with the results of an experiment, reveals that the speech of the three women leaders was subject to more interpretation by the media and was reported in more negative and aggressive language. The study concludes that gendered mediation may hinder women's chances of electoral success.