Chapter 82: Women as Leaders in Television

Natalie Greene

Women as leaders in television When television executives report their core audience, women always come out ahead. For example, ABC's female audience almost doubled its male audience during the 2007–2008 season (Atkinson, 2008). 1 Women on-screen, however, seem to reflect a different reality, making up only 43% of characters in the prime-time 2007–2008 season (Lauzen, 2008). 2 As shown by studies going back as far as the 1970s, women onscreen not only fail to represent the proportional makeup of women in society, they also overwhelmingly show a stereotypically gendered version of women (Signorielli & Bacue, 1999; U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 1977). This chapter aims to address the evolution of women's leadership in prime-time network scripted television from 1950 to 2008. Because of the way that women have been marginalized in television, it is important to study the shows that have featured women as lead characters. Characters such as Love ...

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