I really enjoyed speaking to the students at the Symposium. I spoke with Lydia about how her summer research evolved, and how she discovered that many of the heroic traits in the tall tales she studied were similar to the traits of modern-day superheros, leading her to her thesis topic. I think it’s really interesting to hear how research can start as one thing and then lead to another, similar to what we talked about on one of the first days of class (spies? English nobility? theatre? wow!). I also spoke with Juliana who conducted research on terrorism. I was especially interested in her research on the differing leadership structures of Al Qaeda and ISIS. What really struck me at the event was the diversity of topics pursued by these students. I learned about American culture, terrorism, sustainability, economics, and more. Seeing their completed projects was actually quite inspirational – it’s a shame more students don’t pursue research of some kind.

Proposal Outline

Encyclopedia of Gender in Media, SAGE Publications

Gender and Women’s Leadership: A Reference Handbook, SAGE Publications

Prime-time feminism: television, media culture, and the women’s movement since 1970, Dow

Women watching television: gender, class, and generation in the American television experience, Press

Women and Comedy: History, Theory, Practice, Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

My main method of research will be engaging with the texts – that is, the episodes I will be watching. I plan to watch these episodes several times, first to get familiar with the story lines, characters, and recurring jokes. I am already very familiar with these things, but it is important to refresh my familiarity, particular when it comes to the specific brands of comedy employed in each program. After engaging with these texts in an informal way, I will begin to collect data. I plan to code these episodes – my criteria, however, remains undecided. I could code instances of sexual harassment, identifying different actions such as sexual jokes, glances, and comments. I can also code leadership behaviors, perhaps through the lens of “masculine” vs. “feminine” leadership traits and behaviors. Once I have this data, I can start to hypothesize about the relationship between female leadership and the occurrence of/response to sexual harassment onscreen.

I can manipulate this data in any number of ways in order to understand the relationship between female leadership and sexual harassment onscreen. We spoke about creating a timeline of events and themes that occurred on the shows, and how those events correspond to real-world events and trends. Relating the ideas I present in my thesis to the “real world” is a crucial part of my research.

I will also look at secondary sources. In order to write about something in the field of cultural studies, I will need to be familiar with the literature that already exists. I can consult reference books, encyclopedias, and books that detail the history of comedy, of female leadership, of women in the media, of American television, etc. I will also consult news sources to examine the newsworthy events in American culture that may have shaped the way certain things were portrayed onscreen. I can also look at journal articles that have been written about the shows I’m interested in. Not only will these help with brainstorming and coming up with ideas for the content of my paper, but they will help me get acquainted with how scholarly articles are written in this field. Since the majority of the papers I write at UR are for English classes, I am accustomed to writing in that specific way.

Although I intend to use theoretical sources in my research, most of my time will be spent close reading “passages” that I find particularly relevant to my thesis. I will analyze the content of the scenes – what is said, what actions are done – as well as how different setting, lighting, staging, and blocking choices convey certain messages.

“Prime-Time Television’s Portrayal of Women and the World of Work: A Demographic Profile”

Vande Berg, Leah R., and Diane Streckfuss. ” Prime‐time televisions portrayal of women and the world of work: A demographic profile.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 36, no. 2 (April 1, 1992): 195-208.

Reading Notes

“Previous Research on Working Women in Prime-Time Television”

• Has been focused on three areas: “representation, employment status, and sex-typed behavior and psychological traits”
  • Representation
    • Since 1950s, studies have shown that women are underrepresented on TV
    • Virtually no change between 1950s and 1970s
    • 1989 study found that women are still underrepresented
      • (Do I need to read all of these previous studies? Or just take her word for it?)
    • Employment status
      • Women portrayed in “a much narrower range of roles – primarily as wives and parents – than are men, and that men are more often portrayed as being employed and as holding higher status occupations compared to women (196)
    • Sex-typed behavioral and psychological traits
      • Women more likely to be portrayed as emotional, in need of emotional support, sympathetic, nurturing, reinforcing, lacking interpersonal and occupational power (196)
      • Vande Berg and Trujillo (1989)
        • Organizational actions composed of five categories of behavior:
          • Interpersonal function – development and cultivation of interpersonal activities in the organization, which includes counseling, motivating, and general sociabilities
          • Informational function – disseminating information to or receiving information from organizational insiders and outsiders
          • Decisional function – problem solving and conflict resolution
          • Political function – display, development, or use of power to accomplish individual or group self-interests
          • Operational function – directly resulting in manufacturing products, delivering services, or everyday work tasks being done
        • Quoted from pp. 196-197
      • Analysis will focus on “equality of representation across industries, occupational roles, hierarchical position, depictions, genre, and dramatic tone” (197)
        • Focus on activity, instead of mere presence

“METHODS”

• Sample: 116 prime-time TV program episodes from 2 weeks of programming (NBC, CBS, ABC)
  • 115 of these included a character w/ identifiable occupation, performing an organizational action in at least one scene
    • 115 prime-time episodes, 1944 characters, 7601 actions coded
      • Article only reports findings for the 986 foreground characters (character whose speaking/action role “served as an important plot function”)
    • 2 separate analyses performed (197)
      • Analysis of 986 foreground characters
      • Analysis of 6087 organizational actions performed by the characters
        • For both, 6 contextual variables:
          • Industry
          • Occupational role
          • Hierarchical position
          • Depiction
          • Genre
          • Dramatic tone
        • Vande Berg and Trujillo five-category schema used for coding characters and actions (198)
          • “Action” – verbal or behavioral work-related activity performed in a single scene by a character in an organizational context (198)
          • Each action that corresponded to one of VB & T’s 5 categories was coded

“Contextual Variables”

• Contextual variables were coded for characters and actions
  • Variables:
    • Industry: coded according to 11 major categories of US Department of Labor’s Standard Industrial Classification schema (service; public administration; retail trade; finance; transportation and communication; no industry; other (agriculture, mining, construction, manufacturing, wholesale trade (all of these occurred very infrequently))
    • Occupational role: professionals; managers; service; household; military; other (clerical, sales, crafts, operatives, workers/laborers); student; customer/patient; no occupation; lawbreaker
    • Hierarchical position: “character’s position w/in an organization’s formal power hierarchy” (198); CEO/Board Exec/Top Manager; middle manager; first line manager; upper level professional staff; lower level professional staff; staff; workers/laborers; customer/patient; small business owner; other (position where hierarchy was not identifiable)
    • Depiction: coded according to plot function (positive, negative, or neutral) (199)
      • Positive: “benefitted the organization and its members or the broader society of which the individual or organization was a part”
        • Charitable/philanthropic
        • Sympathetic/helpful
        • Socially or economically productive
        • Friendly
      • Neutral: “displaying mere civility or general politeness with no discernable positive or negative plot function”
      • Negative: “hurt the organization, its members, clients, and/or relevant outsiders, or which harmed the broader society”
        • Unfriendly
        • Greedy/selfish
        • Foolish
        • Malevolent
        • Illegal
      • Genre: comedy; drama; action-adventure; other (including sci-fi, dramedy)
      • Dramatic tone: “the literary backdrop against which the attitude of the ‘author(s)’ toward their characters and their actions was presented”
        • Comedic, serious, combined comedy and serious (irony, dramedy)
          • These classifications will be HUGE when looking at these shows, esp. the Office

“Reliability”

• 2 coders coded character and action data for the different contextual variables (199)
  • Each coder produced a character analysis for each episode (overall summary coding judgement for each variable)
  • Action analysis – scene-by-scene coding of organizational actions
• Then there’s some numbers I don’t understand

“RESULTS”

• I don’t think this study’s results are necessarily relevant to my project. What is important are the methods of collecting this data. The methods may be useful in my own coding projects.

“DISCUSSION”

• Again, I don’t find this section relevant

I took notes (below) on a journal article about depictions of sexual harassment on sitcoms. I think it will be very relevant to my thesis; I’m glad I took very thorough notes. In terms of the note-taking, I don’t feel as though I did anything very different from how I usually take notes. I usually try to include page numbers and citations. I usually include the content of the article as well as my own thoughts and questions. However, I don’t always type up my notes so thoroughly. I’m worried that I will be too thorough with every source I read. What I need to work on is reading more aggressively, only focusing on the relevant information, or else I will never finish this project.

“Not a Laughing Matter: Sexual Harassment as ‘Material’ on Workplace-Based Situation Comedies”

Montemurro, Beth. “Not a Laughing Matter: Sexual Harassment as “Material” on Workplace-Based Situation Comedies.” Sex Roles 48, no. 9/10 (2003): 433-445.

Abstract: “In her book Sexual Harassment of Working Women Catherine MacKinnon (1979) suggested that ‘Trivialization of sexual harassment has been a major means through which its invisibility has been enforced. Humor, which may reflect unconscious hostility, has been a major form of that trivialization’ (p. 52). In other words, making jokes at women’s expense and treating sexual harassment as not serious have contributed to its persistence. Situation comedies can be seen as gauges for what is considered humorous in American culture. To explore the tone of and mood toward sexual harassment in contemporary American society, themes and content of ‘humorous’ material on 56 episodes of five workplace-based situation comedies were examined. Results showed that although sexual harassment is rarely discussed on situation comedies, gender harassment is frequently used as ‘material,’ which leads to further trivialization of a serious social problem.”

• Main idea: Sexual harassment as “humorous material” on situation comedies contributes to the trivialization of sexual harassment in American society.
• Questions:
  • What is the difference between “gender harassment” and “sexual harassment”? (Montemurro, 433)
  • What does MacKinnon mean when she says that humor “‘may reflect unconscious hostility’”? (MacKinnon, 52, cited in Montemurro, 433)

Reading Notes

Introduction

• Television has a profound impact on Americans’ “perceptions of gender roles and other social issues” (Montemurro, 433).
  • She cites several studies that have shown this
  • Justifying the study of television (its profound sociological impact is undeniable, p. 433)
• In making jokes about social issues, sitcoms trivialize the problems (Montemurro, 433 (citing Grauerholtz and King))
• Sitcoms also reinforce “stereotypes and negative images/perceptions of serious topics” (Montemurro, 434 (citing Fouts and Burggraf)
• Problems with making jokes about sexual harassment:
  • Definition of sexual harassment becomes “clouded” (434)
  • Sexual harassment not seen as a serious issue (434)
• Why does it matter?
  • Sexual harassment in the workplace perpetuates women’s status as “subordinate workers and second class citizens” (434)
  • Women not employees, but “objects/bodies” (434, citing Acker)
  • When we see sitcoms portray instances of sexual harassment in a humorous way time and time again, this maintains women’s “subordinate status” (434, citing Grauerholz and King, hooks, and Jhally)
    • QUESTION: Does this have to do with the content specifically, or the repeated viewing of that content and subsequent internalization of the message?
  • Also, “portrayals of women and work on prime-time programs depict women as less serious workers” (434, citing Vande Berg and Streckfuss)
  • The effect on children
    • Young boys less likely to interpret material of sexual harassment as negative (434, citing Murnen and Smolak)
    • Children learn this behavior, contributing to the maintenance of the issue
      • QUESTION: How much do I want to focus on the child/early socialization aspect? I feel as though it might be a rabbit hole I could easily fall down.
    • Ford’s study (cited on page 436)
  • Montemurro’s Purpose and Methods of Inquiry:
    • Wants to determine “whether sexual harassment is present, prevalent, and/or trivialized” (434)
    • Wants to question “whether sexual harassment is being used as humorous material on situation comedies”
      • Hypothesis: it is. (based on previous studies: Dow, Fouts and Burggraf, Grauerholz and King, Signorielli)
    • Addresses the following issues
      • Frequency of sexual harassment as material in sitcoms
      • In what form is sexual harassment depicted? Is it explicit or implicit?
      • Does the “gender composition of the televised workplace” affect how sexual harassment is treated on the show?
        • My question is similar, but focuses on female leadership in particular
      • How does the workplace environment affect the frequency of sexual harassment?
        • This is a question I could ask as well. There is more “opportunity” for sexual harassment on the set of a TV show (a la 30 Rock) than there is in a paper company office (The Office) (Although plenty of sexual harassment seems to happen on both shows)

“Defining Sexual Harassment”

• Sexual harassment is prevalent; women experience more sexual harassment than men
  • She cites several studies here. I could refer to those as well, but most of them were published in the 90s. I think I can definitely find more recent studies that also state that sexual harassment is still prevalent (obviously).
  • I can also use more “popular” sources here, referring to highly publicized instances of sexual harassment (Weinstein, Fox News, etc.)
• QUESTION: She states why sexual harassment is problematic – is this something I need to do? Can I just assume that in 2018, my audience will know that sexual harassment is problematic?
• Different types of sexual harassment (feminist scholars)
  • “Sexual harassment” – “Quid pro quo” – “clear demand of sexual favors in return for work related benefits” (435), “’turning a professional relationship into a sexual relationship that is not wanted by one of the people involved that is coercive because the initiator has some power over the other person’” (435, quoting Lorber, p. 250)
  • “Gender harassment” – “condition of work/hostile environment” (435), “’inappropriately calling attention to women’s or men’s bodies, sexuality or marital status” (435, quoting Lorber, p. 250)
    • Using person’s gender to point out “the individual’s capabilities or career commitment” (434, quoting Lorber, p. 250)
  • Important to know the difference between the two in order to properly discuss the issue
    • It is a complex and often ambiguous issue; using it as humorous material perpetuatues this ambiguity (435)
    • QUESTION: what do I want to focus on?

“Women on Television”

• Important to study audience reactions because “television… often functions to connect individuals to the larger social world” (435, citing Press)
  • QUESTION: How much do I want to focus on audience reactions/perceptions? I think I might want to focus more on the content of the shows… but I also think it is important to analyze the effect of the content on the viewers.
• Correlation between acceptance of “feminist” TV characters and “general societal attitudes toward feminism and the women’s movement” (435, citing Dow)
  • QUESTION: Can some shows be ahead of their time (i.e. too “progressive” for mainstream societal standards) and still succeed?
• Montemurro cites a 2000 study that analyzed images of women in sitcoms in terms of their weight. The study found that heavier women were treated more negatively than thinner women (and that the laugh tracks used reinforced these “stereotypic values” (436, quoting Fouts and Burggraf)
  • Interesting idea, but I’m not sure it’s relevant because of its outdated-ness. Perhaps I can find a more recent study that touches on this idea? I can certainly think of a lot of instances in my TV shows that portray heavier women in a negative way for laughs.
• Montemurro looking in depth at five different programs, watching them first to gain an understanding of the characters’ relationship and context
  • Context is crucial – two characters might already have “an established flirting pattern” that makes what could be interpreted as sexual harassment tolerable in context (436)
• Looking at both sexual harassment (SH) and gender harassment (GH), making the distinction between the two
  • Montemurro points out that Grauerholz and King did not distinguish between the two, resulting in misleading data
• Why no dramas?
  • Montemurro interested in how “images of sexual harassment are trivialized.” Dramas provide much more context, often dealing with the issue far more seriously than comedies (436).
  • Comedies are “focused on making the viewer laugh and on the simple restoration of order” (436, citing Marc)
    • We talked about the same thing in Shakespeare class – interesting that the basic formula of the comedy has not changed
  • Montemurro talks a lot about the effects of the laugh tracks. The shows I’m interested in do not have a laugh track. From what I know about television in general, it seems that laugh tracks were once more popular than they are now. Perhaps this is relevant to my thesis in terms of how television is evolving?
    • QUESTION: Additionally, in terms of form, although all three shows are workplace-based, The Office and Parks and Recreation are “mockumentaries.” What impact could this have on the content, if any?
  • Claims that comedies have “specific motivations, one of which is to assert superiority” (436, citing Giles, Bourhis, Gadfield, Davies, and Davies).
    • Humor used to “maintain boundaries between men and women in the workplace” (Kanter)

“METHOD”

“Operational Definitions”

• Definition of sexual harassment, combined from two sources:
  • Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC): legal definition of workplace sexual harassment, defining “who can and can’t be harassed”
    • “Harasser can be of either sex” 438
    • “Harasser can be a coworker, a supervisor, a client, or other person not employed by the organization” 438
    • “Victims not only include those who are directly harassed but also those who are adversely affected by sexual harassment” 438
    • “Harasser’s conduct must be unwelcome” 438
  • United States Merit System Protection Board (USMSPB): measured sexual harassment using following categories:
    • “Jokes: uninviting sexual teasing, jokes, remarks or questions”
    • “Looks: uninvited sexually suggestive looks or gestures”
    • “Dates: uninvited pressure for dates”
    • “Calls: uninvited letters, phone calls, or material of a sexual nature”
    • “Touches: uninvited and deliberate touching, leaning over, cornering or pinching”
    • “Favors: Uninvited pressure for sexual favors”
    • (Horan and Semora, p. 12)
  • Montemurro uses these definitions as guidelines for her study.
    • “Jokes, looks, calls” “classified as hostile environment/gender harassment” 438
    • “Touches, favors, dates” “quid pro quo sexual harassment” 438
  • Every incident of harassment – sexual and gender – recorded
    • Any “relevant verbal, nonverbal, or physical exchange” 438
    • Incidents not mutually exclusive: one incident could be both a “look” and a “joke” for example 438
  • Incidents also coded by two research assistants

“RESULTS AND DISCUSSION”

“The Presence and Frequency of Harassment”

• I don’t think it’s necessary to closely analyze her findings here. I am not interested in the shows she discusses. However, it could be helpful to use her methods as a basis for my own study.
  • This is the part I’m bad at. Data. I have no idea what her tables really mean. I understand what she’s doing here, but once she turns it into numbers, I’m lost.
• Gender Harassment
  • She presents the data in paragraph form. Then she gives a few examples.
  • Finds that “jokes” were most prevalent. Provides explanation for this:
    • “Humor has specific motivations and goals in interaction. One of these goals is to establish in-group and out-group boundaries (Francis, 1994; Giles et al., 1976/1996). Humor or joke-telling can be used as a way for members of an in-group to acknowledge and strengthen bonds while at the same time excluding the out-group, those who are the subjects or objects of the joke” 441 (also citing Francis, 1994)
    • In this case, the in-group is men and the out-group is women.
  • Sexual Harassment
    • Again, presents data, gives examples
    • Sexual harassment occurred a lot less than gender harassment
  • “Gender Composition of the Workplace”
    • In “real life,” harassment “is initiated by someone in a position of power, and more often by a man than a woman” (citing Matchen and DeSouza, Renzetti and Curran)
    • Statistics from Montemurro’s study show that “jokes” occurred far more often in workplaces where men were in positions of authority (443)
    • Men in positions of authority tolerated harassment (443)
      • Reflecting societal attitudes toward gender and harassment
    • “Workplace Atmosphere”
      • Discussing the fact that some workplaces are more “sexualized” than others
      • Not sure this is relevant to me

Further reading (cited in article):

• MacKinnon, Sexual Harassment of Working Women: A Case of Sex Discrimination
• Dow, Prime-time feminism: Television, media culture, and the women’s movement since 1970
• Fouts and Burggraf, “Television situation comedies: Female weight, male negative comments, and audience reactions”
• Press, Women watching television: Class, gender, and generation in the American television experience
• Grauerholz and King, “Prime time sexual harassment”
• Acker, “Hierarchies, jobs, bodies: A theory of gendered organizations”
• Hooks, Cultural criticism and transformation
• Vande Berg and Streckfuss, “Prime-time television’s portrayal of women and the world of work”
• Murnen and Smolak, “The experience of sexual harassment among grade school students: Early socialization of female subordination?”
• Signorielli, “Television and consequences about sex roles: Maintaining conventionality and the status quo”
• Lorber, Paradoxes of gender
• Ford, “Effects of sexist humor on tolerance of sexist events”
• Kanter, Men and women of the corporation
• Horan and Semora, Sexual harassment in the workplace: What can sociological research contribute?
• Giles et al., “Cognitive aspects of humor in social interaction”
• Francis, Laughter, the best medication

Birthisel, Jessica, and Jason A. Martin. ““That’s What She Said”: Gender, Satire, and the American Workplace on the Sitcom The Office.” Journal of Communication Inquiry 37, no. 1 (2013): 64-80.

Carroll, Noël. Humour: a very short introduction. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Dickinson, Peter, Anne Higgins, St Pierre Paul Matthew, Diana Solomon, and Sean Zwagerman, eds. Women and comedy: history, theory, practice. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2017.

Finney, Gail, ed. Look Who’s Laughing: Gender and Comedy. Amsterdam: Gordon and Breach, 1994.

Gillon, Josh. “Why 30 Rock Is Not Funny (Its Metafunny).” Philosophy and Literature 35, no. 2 (2011): 320-37.

Hurley, Matthew M. Inside jokes: using humor to reverse-engineer the mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2013.

Justin, Neal. “In Hollywood, women are increasingly calling the shots on television.” The Seattle Times. December 13, 2017. Accessed February 19, 2018.

Lauzen, Martha. “The Funny Business of Being Tina Fey: Constructing a (feminist) comedy icon.” Feminist Media Studies 14, no. 1 (2012): 106-17.

Lauzen, Martha. “What we know for sure about women in television.” Women’s Media Center. September 28, 2017. Accessed February 19, 2018. http://www.womensmediacenter.com/news-features/what-we-know-for-sure-about-women-in-television.

Martin, Jason. “Emotionally Intelligent Leadership at30 Rock: What Librarians Can Learn from a Case Study of Comedy Writers.” Journal of Library Administration 56, no. 4 (2015): 345-58.

McRobbie, Angela. “Post-feminism and popular culture.” Feminist Media Studies 4, no. 3 (2004): 255-64.

Merrill, Lisa. “Feminist humor: Rebellious and self‐affirming.” Womens Studies15, no. 1-3 (1988): 271-80.

Mizejewski, Linda. “Feminism, Postfeminism, Liz Lemonism: Comedy and Gender Politics on 30 Rock.” Genders, no. 55 (2012).

Montemurro, Beth. “Not a Laughing Matter: Sexual Harassment as “Material” on Workplace-Based Situation Comedies.” Sex Roles 48, no. 9/10 (2003): 433-445.

Morreall, John. The philosophy of laughter and humor. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1987.

Owen, Rob. “Sexual harassment has a long history as a comedic punchline on TV.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 30, 2017. Accessed February 19, 2018.

Robinson, Joanna. “The Nasty Women of TV Comedy Have Arrived Just in Time.” Vanity Fair. November 01, 2016. Accessed February 19, 2018.

Sills, Liz. “The phenomenology of The Funny: a diagrammatic proposal.” Comedy Studies8, no. 1 (April 02, 2017): 2-12.

Sims, David. “Louis C.K. and Abuse of Power in the Comedy World.” The Atlantic, November 9, 2017. Accessed February 19, 2018.

Sink, Alexander, and Dana Mastro. “Depictions of Gender on Primetime Television: A Quantitative Content Analysis.” Mass Communication and Society 20, no. 1 (2016): 3-22.

Swink, Robyn Stacia. “Lemony Liz and likable Leslie: audience understandings of feminism, comedy, and gender in women-led television comedies.” Feminist Media Studies 17, no. 1 (2017): 14-28.

“That’s What She Said: Depictions of Sexual Harassment on TV.” Slate, December 18, 2017. Accessed February 19, 2018.

Tiffany, Kaitlyn. “TV shows created by women have more speaking parts for women, study finds.” The Verge. September 12, 2017. Accessed February 19, 2018.

“TV Statistics.” Womenandhollywood.com. Accessed February 19, 2018. https://womenandhollywood.com/resources/statistics/tv-statistics/.

Things to research – topics, keywords, etc.:

• history of television
• television industry (current)
• women in comedy
• feminist film/TV studies / media studies
• female writers, producers, creators, showrunners
• depictions of women in leadership roles on TV
• keywords: comedy, women, television, feminist, leadership, Tina Fey

Possible resources:

• Books
  • history of America TV/comedy/entertainment/media, to get a historical context
  • memoirs and autobiographies, for first-hand accounts, anecdotes, insider perspective
• Interviews
• the shows themselves
• articles from periodicals about:
  • feminist media studies
  • popular film and television
  • cultural studies (21st century America)
• Encyclopedia of Television

Questions about the research process:

1. How do I weed out info that isn’t useful so I don’t waste my time on unhelpful articles/books?
2. How do I determine if a source is credible and unbiased?
3. Can I use sources that state opinion or are biased?
4. How can I use my sources to narrow down my topic? Won’t more information just broaden my topic?
5. How do I know when I’ve done enough research?
6. How extensively do I need to use each source? Can I use a small amount of info from one source without referring to the bigger argument made in that source?
7. How do I figure out with discipline my topic falls under?
8. How do I make a topic that some may find trivial seem important/sound scholarly/

Topics/questions that interest me:

1. (Under the umbrella of depictions of female leadership in television)
   How has it changed over time? Are we getting better or worse? What defines “better”?
2. How do world events (e.g. politics) affect what we see on TV with regards to female leadership?
3. How do comedies and dramas deal with female leadership differently/similarly?
4. What effect does female leadership behind the scenes (producers, creators, writers, directors, etc.) have on what appears on screen?
5. What types of female leadership are most common or uncommon on TV? Leadership in the workplace? In politics? In families?