La presencia femenina en la cobertura informativa de los medios online de Brasil en 2014: un estudio de género de las noticias en internet

Abstract

The present research is based on the Study of the Contents of Communication in the Digital Era and its goal is to analyse the female presence as subject and object of online news. The research shows the analysis of the content of 3.473 online headlines of five of the main means of communication in Brazil, with a solid online presence, to assess the appearance of characteristics related to gender in their online contents. In order to achieve its goal, there has been designed a methodology which implies different levels of analysis of the news (text, image and audio) to identify gender presence through ownership and presentation, characters and role, themes, fonts and gender related comments as well as the mention of gender and proper name in the text. Such steps were taken as to identify general online news characteristics and the presence (or absence) of female gender to learn where the problematic gender representations are. _x000D_ Gender inequality in the media is a pending issue in our society and it is stablished as a reduced and stereotyped role in the contents of the means of communication, in the hierarchies of media power and in society. Gender representation in the means of communication tend to soften the common differences between men and women, associating the last to home and domestic environment, family, body sensitiveness or emotions. For the men, they are mostly associated to the public and social environment, in a social hierarchical dynamic that determines what it means to be a man or a woman. Gender is a component that has proven to affect news coverage through the selection and choice of topics, the differentiation in the fonts or the nuances and treatment of the story. _x000D_ Considering the characteristics of online platforms, it is fair to say that the online environment is more open to diversity if compared to traditional or printed media. It can also attempt to bridge the gap in gender differences in means of communication. This new approach from means of communication to the digital environment is basically done in relation to the type of content, the integration of different platforms of communication and news that affect the production and following distribution of the news by a variety of channels, allowing the journalist with more possibilities, better connection to readers and further possibilities of interaction. _x000D_ The current study diagnoses the gender situation in the online contents in order to contribute to a better practice, which aims to level the differences in the representation of men and women, and possible gender inequalities inherited from the ordinary mass media. _x000D_ The results show a clear gender unbalance concerning men and women for the simple fact that the great majority of the headlines are about or depict men, apart from being written or interpreted from a male perspective. The news related to women are mostly related to topics such as “human interests” and are excluded of relevant current political, national, economical or sports topics. Furthermore, the results also show evidence that the main means of communication in Brazil depict an stablished perspective of reality from a male point of view, omitting the proper name of women and introducing men as the main subjects and “spokesman of reality”. Women are defined by their personal traits, physical appearance, beauty, body and feelings and for their role towards men and family, in a repetition of traditional roles, which define what it means to be a man or a woman. There is an immediate qualitative and quantitative change in the treatment of gender in the news.

Date of Award	14 Nov 2016
Original language	Undefined/Unknown
Supervisor	Natividad Ramajo Hernandez (Director)