Facing the music: Stereotyping of and by women in US music journalism

Abstract

This study updates and expands the application of stereotyping and professional socialization to music journalism in a way that is generalizable to the United States music journalism industry, and seeks to understand the role women journalists play in counteracting or perpetuating stereotyping of women musicians. A content analysis of 936 articles finds significant stereotyping of women musicians in major US music publications during 2016. The stories, randomly sampled from eight top US publications, were predominantly about men artists and by men authors, and were more likely to discuss women musicians’ appearance and relationships, and used more sexualized and emotional language. Improvement was found in that articles were no more likely to discuss women musicians’ age and youth than men’s. Women journalists were just as likely to stereotype women musicians as men journalists were, and more so in one category. We expand stereotyping by incorporating insights from professional socialization and applying it to the ‘soft news’ yet male-dominated field of music journalism, adding to our knowledge of hard news fields such as politics, business and sports. It also updates the few studies of music journalism from decades ago, showing little progress in the blatant stereotyping of women musicians