Journal article
The Unpalatable-Palatable: Feminism in the Australian Mainstream Media
Outskirts, Vol.3, pp.1-9
2017
Abstract
The changing role of mainstream media has transformed how feminist issues are disseminated and debated resulting in the number of feminist commentators in the Australian media substantially increasing. This amplification of feminist discourse by certain voices is occurring due to the possibilities for celebritisation generated by online and social media, gendered news and lifestyle commentaries. While this opens up space for greater representation of feminist voices, paradoxically, much of the feminist discourse in the mainstream media problematically reinforces the dominant paradigm rather than challenges it. Mainstream media celebrity feminist can seem unvarying in their homogeneity; their presence is non-threatening, privileged and palatable, and is often connected with a 'feminism-as-a-business model'. In contrast, feminists who are perceived as more difficult or dogmatic as positioned as outliers or unpalatable. In this article, we discuss data collected in 2014 from two breakfast TV panels, The Mixed Grill (Today) and Kochie's Angels (Sunrise) when both offered all female panels, headed by the male hosts of the programs. We also look at the same panels on both programs again in 2016 after they had been renamed as The Grill (Today) and Newsfeed (Sunrise), and had been restructured to include male panelists. In this paper we discuss contemporary celebrity feminism and question if the populist feminisms advocated in the mainstream media can offer opportunities for substantive political change or are devoid of meaningful feminist politics. These questions are explored through the conceptual framework of the unpalatable-palatable which asserts that celebrity feminism is not an uncomplicated or binaristic state but instead reflects a disrupted and disruptive state of flux.
Details
- Title
- The Unpalatable-Palatable: Feminism in the Australian Mainstream Media
- Authors
- Sarah Casey (Author) - Griffith UniversityJuliet Watson (Author) - RMIT University
- Publication details
- Outskirts, Vol.3, pp.1-9
- Publisher
- University of Western Australia
- Date published
- 2017
- ISSN
- 1445-0445; 1445-0445
- Copyright note
- Copyright © 2017. Reproduced here in accordance with the publishers copyright policy.
- Organisation Unit
- School of Business and Creative Industries; University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland; School of Creative Industries - Legacy
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99450888802621
- Output Type
- Journal article
- Research Statement
- false
Metrics
150 File views/ downloads
574 Record Views