ABSTRACT

Debates over the question of how journalists construct the ‘world out there’ for their audiences need to be recast, as several of the contributions to the previous section’s discussion suggested, so as to bring to the fore the problem of how this discursive power is (en)gendered. That is to say, these debates take on a new resonance once we enquire into the issue of precisely who possesses the means to make their definition of the ‘reality’ of gender relations prevail over alternative definitions. It is a commitment to elaborating upon this complex issue with respect to specific instances of reportage which forms a unifying thread throughout the chapters presented in this section of the book. Each chapter adopts a different conceptual and methodological approach to investigate the means by which gender relations are caught up in ideological struggles over definitional ascendancy. Analyses range from examinations of how these gendered realities are embedded at the level of newswork practices, to their re-inscription as ‘common sense’ in news narratives, and to their negotiation by listeners, readers or viewers. Overall, then, these chapters share the aim of discerning the often subtle, taken-for-granted strategies in and through which journalists, knowingly or not, routinely define ‘what counts as reality’ in alignment with patriarchal renderings of the social world.