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Islands of Divergence in a Stream of Convergence

2013; Routledge; Volume: 15; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/1461670x.2013.790619

1469-9699

Zvi Reich,

Gender, Feminism, and Media

AbstractThis study focuses on the performance of female and male reporters in various news processes for which little systematic research has been accomplished. It is based primarily on a series of reconstruction interviews with 60 Israeli reporters in parallel beats and on the ways in which they obtained material for a sample of their recently published items (N=494). Findings challenge the accepted theoretical wisdom which suggests that male and female reporters obtain news differently. Regrettably, female reporters do not diversify the overwhelmingly restricted and male-hegemonic source pool. Female journalists show some greater journalistic initiative and greater time pressures. Gender discrimination migrated to less observable arenas: female reporters experience more editorial involvement in their news work and a greater news beat overload. Together with reduced emphasis on exclusivity and newsroom presence, these factors endanger the status that female journalists achieved in a long and exhausting struggle.KEYWORDS: genderjournalismmale/female reportersnews practicesnews sourcessource diversityView correction statement:Corrigendum ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSThis research was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (Grant No. 1104/11). The author is thankful to Dr. Hagar Lahav for her insights and contributive remarks to an earlier version of this paper, to Dr. Rafi Mann for his contribution in status judgment, and Dr. Einat Lachover for her theoretical advice. Many thanks to my students Yifat Naim, Igal Godler and Inbal Avraham for their assistance in data collection, and to Tali Avishay-Arbel for her statistical advice.Notes1. The other dimensions were: gender typing, gender symbolism, gender expectations and gendered professional identities.2. The study involved only news outlets in their principal medium of activity, avoiding subsidiary outlets that make second-hand use of their mother organizations’ contents. Print press: Haaretz, Yedioth Ahronoth, Maariv; free papers: Israel Hayom, Israel Post; Radio: Kol Israel and Galey Zahal; television: Channels 1, 2 and 10; internet: Ynet, Walla, News 1 (Mahlaka Rishona). The total number of reporters in the news and business departments of the organizations studied was 393—a third of whom were female journalists. Hence the 133 reporters that were interviewed comprise about a third (33.8 percent) of the total reporting corps in the beats studied.3. For each female reporter, we selected the most equivalent male partner, according to the following criteria: (1) Member of the same news organization, or at least the same medium and the same organization type (e.g., avoiding coupling a reporter from a popular paper with an elite one, or a reporter from a public broadcasting network with that of a private one). (2) Covering a beat from the same category. (3) Closest number of years in journalism. For two female reporters, we could not find male mates who fit the criteria. In terms of media, the 60 reporters comprised 18 print, 18 radio, 12 television and 12 internet reporters; in terms of beat clusters they included 12 political, 36 domestic affairs and 12 financial.4. D-Statistic was calculated as the average for male reporters minus the average for female reporters, divided by the pooled estimate of standard deviation. As suggested, effect sizes of 0.20–0.49 were considered small, 0.50–0.79 medium, and 0.80 and above large (Cohen Citation1992, 157).5. Items that were produced within one hour or less comprised 12 percent of the items on television, 30 percent in print, 79 percent on radio and 72 percent online.6. According to our findings, female journalists comprise a third of the reporting staff. The actual figures are probably closer to 35 percent, however, as found in the Global Media Monitoring Project (Citation2005, 135; 2010, 94), as female journalists are probably slightly more prevalent in soft news beats, magazines and local news, that were not studied here. Lachover (2000) measured 37 percent in the print press and Limor and Lavie (2002) measured 41 percent in five leading Israeli dailies. In the Global Journalist project (Weaver and Willnat 2012, 530–531), Israel lags behind in average proportion of woman journalists with only 29 percent. These figures, however, probably underestimate the proportion of female journalists in Israel because of overrepresentation of senior journalists.