Still in the Minor Leagues

Still in the Minor Leagues by Tracy Everbach on Scribd

A “wise Latina” and a son of immigrants

A “wise Latina” and a son of immigrants: Comparing newspaper coverage of Sonia Sotomayor and Samuel Alito

Tracy Everbach, Ph.D.

University of North Texas

Mayborn School of Journalism

1155 Union Circle #311460

Denton, Texas 76203-5017

214-995-8464

Everbach@unt.edu

 Published in Southwestern Mass Communication Journal 26, 2 (Spring 2011)

Abstract

            This research paper compares coverage of the U.S. Senate Judiciary hearings for Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Sonia Sotomayor in two leading United States newspapers, The New York Times and the Washington Post. The qualitative textual analysis examines news frames employed by the two papers and finds that they focused on the horserace, the nominees’ personalities, their ethnicity and gender roles. The study concludes that the newspaper coverage failed to provide much useful information to the public about how the nominees would perform on the court, instead focusing on the politics of the hearings. It also concludes that coverage focused heavily on Sotomayor’s ethnicity but paid scant attention to Alito’s and that the newspapers cast Sotomayor and Martha-Ann Alito, Samuel Alito’s wife, into stereotypical female gender roles. Alito similarly was defined in a stereotypical male gender role.

Introduction

Sonia Sotomayor made history in August 2009 when she was confirmed as the first Hispanic person and the third woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.  However, her confirmation did not come without controversy. Women’s groups and Hispanic groups complained she had been viciously attacked in the media. Conservatives charged that President Obama nominated her to the court only because of her race and gender. Several conservative pundits, primarily white males, attacked her in gendered and racial terms. “She’s an angry woman, she’s a bigot, she’s a racist,” said Rush Limbaugh on his talk show. Former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove characterized her as “acting like sort of a schoolmarm.” Commentator Pat Buchanan called her an “affirmative action pick.” And talk show host G. Gordon Liddy of Watergate fame made the bizarre comment that he hoped “the key conferences aren’t when she’s menstruating or something.” Sotomayor was 55 years old when she was nominated to the court (Women’s Media Center, 2009).

During Sotomayor’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing in July 2009, Republican members of the Senate Judiciary committee questioned her temperament and her fairness. One of their main concerns was a 2001 speech in which she called herself a “wise Latina” whose decisions could be informed by her ethnic and gender background and might be superior to those of a white male. (Sotomayor grew up in the Bronx, the daughter of Puerto Rican parents.) During the hearings, columnist Kathleen Parker in the Washington Post took to task the Republican male senators on the judiciary committee for their condemnation of Sotomayor:  “Are we to infer that men of European descent are never unduly influenced by their own ethnicity, gender or political preferences? Can anyone affirm this assertion with a straight face?” (Parker, 2009).  In addition, Post columnist Eugene Robinson pointed out that critics of the “wise Latina” comment were operating on “a flawed assumption: that whiteness and maleness are not themselves facets of a distinct identity” (Robinson, 2009).

            Sotomayor, a Yale Law School graduate with 17 years of experience on the bench, ultimately became a Supreme Court justice. But the intense scrutiny raised questions. Only two of the 17 judiciary committee members who conducted the Sotomayor hearings were female. Would a male undergo the same kind of criticism and partisan attacks? Would he be questioned in the same way? An opportunity for a case study arose. Three years before Sotomayor’s nomination, Samuel Alito, a white male, faced the same panel. Alito is the son of an Italian immigrant and like Sotomayor, graduated from Yale Law School. Both he and Sotomayor attended Princeton University as undergraduates. He also was 55 years old when nominated. And he, too, made a public statement about his ethnic background informing his judicial work:

When a case comes before me involving, let’s say, someone who is an immigrant — and we get an awful lot of immigration cases and naturalization cases — I can’t help but think of my own ancestors, because it wasn’t that long ago when they were in that position… When I get a case about discrimination, I have to think about people in my own family who suffered discrimination because of their ethnic background or because of religion or because of gender. And I do take that into account (C-SPAN, January 11, 2006)

            This study examines how the two Senate Judiciary Committee hearings, Alito’s and Sotomayor’s, were covered in two leading U.S. newspapers, The New York Times and The Washington Post. It examines media frames used to characterize a Hispanic woman and a white man, both of whom were being questioned about the same job, Supreme Court justice. It asks the research question: How did two leading U.S. newspapers frame coverage of Samuel Alito’s and Sonia Sotomayor’s Supreme Court confirmations? The study examines the similarities and differences in the framing and tries to determine if the justices’ race and/or gender played a factor in newspaper characterizations of them.

Literature review

            The first woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court was Sandra Day O’Connor, nominated by President Reagan in 1981. Another woman did not join the highest court in the land until 1993, when Ruth Bader Ginsburg was nominated by President Clinton. Little literature was found about media coverage of women in the state or federal judiciary, but some studies exist on news coverage of women as political candidates for federal offices. Kahn and Goldenberg (1991) found in a content analysis of U.S. Senate campaign coverage in the 1980s that news organizations report on male and female political candidates differently, concentrating more on women’s viability as candidates rather than their stance on issues.  The authors also found that female candidates received less media attention than males and when they were covered, were characterized as less competitive than male candidates. When writing about female candidates, female reporters were found to concentrate more on issues than male reporters. The authors noted media coverage during the time period “may serve as a critical obstacle for women running for the U.S. Senate” (Kahn & Goldenberg, p. 180).

However, six years later Smith (1997) found in a newspaper content analysis that media portrayals of 1990s female candidates had become more equitable. The year 1992 was known as “The Year of the Woman,” following Anita Hill’s 1991 testimony at U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ confirmation hearings. Hill’s accusations of sexual harassment led to greater awareness and legal reforms that acknowledged such harassment as a civil offense. Just after the 1992 election, more women than ever before served in Congress: six in the Senate, and 47 in the House of Representatives (Abramson, 2009). One of the 1992 Senate newcomers was Dianne Feinstein of California, who 17 years later was a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee at Sotomayor’s hearing. Smith’s research on 1990s female candidates in statewide campaigns suggested media coverage perpetuated systematic gender stereotypes, although “they are not so glaring as reported in previous studies” (p. 71). He found that women were portrayed less as novelties than in the past, but news media continued to pay more attention to male candidates.

The same year, Carroll and Schrieber (1997) concluded that newspaper coverage reflected both positive and negative stereotypes of female politicians in the U.S. Congress. In their content analysis of articles in 27 major newspapers in 1993 and 1994, they found that women elected to Congress in 1992 received more media attention than men elected the same year. They also concluded that women were portrayed as “agents of change” (Carroll and Schrieber, p. 145).  Still, media coverage adhered to a number of stereotypes, including stories about women’s appearances and clothing and coverage in newspapers’ style pages rather than news sections. And the coverage focused mainly on women’s involvement in so-called “women’s issues,” such as women’s health and abortion.

By the 2000s, women politicians still faced hackneyed characterizations. Maytal (2005) examined newspaper coverage of women officeholders in the 108^th Congress during 2003. She concluded that congresswomen received less newspaper coverage than congressmen, except for stories published in newspaper lifestyle sections that focused on their personal lives. In follow-up interviews with press secretaries for female House of Representative members, Maytal found that some congresswomen’s hairstyles and roles  as mothers had been mentioned in stories about issues; e.g., Representative Nancy Pelosi was identified as “the mother of five” in an article about the Democratic Party’s legislative strategy (Maytal, p. 7).

News frames are structures journalists employ, consciously or unconsciously, to make sense of the material they report. Erving Goffman defined frames as a “specific set of expectations used to make sense of a social situation at a given point in time” (Baran & Davis, 2009, p. 317).  Norris described frames as ways to “simplify, prioritize and structure the narrative flow of events when covering men and women in public life” (Norris, 1997, p. 6). Gender becomes a factor in framing when women are portrayed in ways that support the dominant ideology regarding women’s social roles. In a patriarchal society, women hold secondary status and media frames tend to reinforce that status. Tuchman (1978) and Gans (1979) established that news is socially constructed and relies upon official sources composed of those who hold power: typically, white, middle-aged males. News coverage is framed to support the status quo, which favors the interests of those in power, and frames reinforce common narratives and images to make sense of social structures (Baran & Davis, 2009; Norris, 1997).

            Journalists learn to employ frames through their professional training and practices, and therefore may not consciously reinforce gender stereotypes. However, the ways journalists present news coverage often fall under common socially constructed frames. Women in media stories often are portrayed as victims, mothers, wives, or other roles in society’s private sphere rather than the public sphere, and less often as those in power or seeking power within government or the corporate world. When women do seek power or hold power, media patterns show they may be depicted within frames such as “the first woman” to hold the position; as outsiders, not members of the dominant group; or as agents of change (Norris, 1997; Rakow & Wackwitz, 2004).

            The concept of “the other” addresses the marginalized roles of women and minorities in society, with white males of U.S. or European descent considered in media representations as the norm or the powerful (Byerly, 2007). Media perpetuate these societal beliefs, although groups representing “the other” have made inroads through activism and social movements. Women, minorities and other groups that defy traditional gender, racial and sexual norms also have been framed in news media as outsiders. Tuchman’s (1978) notion of symbolic annihilation states that those framed as “the other” are either marginalized, dismissed, trivialized or condemned in media (McGregor, 2000). Women who seek power in patriarchal society may be framed as “extremists and deviants,” sexualized as objects or undermined by a focus on their personal relationships and personality traits (Gibson, 2009). These patterns are repeated in mainstream media, which set the agenda for what is considered important in society, as McCombs and Shaw noted in 1972.  Mainstream media also play a role in how society understands gender roles. The hegemonic function of the news media protects the interests of males, who hold the majority of power in the U.S. Also, journalism continues to be a male-dominated business, with women composing about 37 percent of newspaper staffs (ASNE, 2010) and 40 percent of the television news workforce (RTNDA, 2007). In journalism management, two out of three newsroom supervisors are male and three out of four television news directors are male (McCormick Foundation, 2010). It stands to reason that the socially constructed news products disseminated in the United States favor the interests of men, whether the selection and presentation of what is considered newsworthy is conscious or unconscious.

            News products may be read and analyzed as journalist-prepared texts that help the public to understand issues, events and other people (Bronstein, 2005). By consuming repetitive patterns and topics as part of their media diets, readers and viewers learn to make sense of reality through journalistic presentations. “Given the majority of citizens’ lack of personal ties to emerging social movements, media frames can be a powerful influence in the construction of public opinion,” according to Bronstein (p. 786). Frames also are important because of what they leave out, giving only a partial or generalized version of a topic. Therefore, journalism becomes a conduit for routine, expected ideas that uphold the power order (Baran & Davis, 2009).

Method

            The New York Times and The Washington Post were chosen as units for study. The New York Times was chosen because it is considered the standard-bearer for excellent journalism in the United States. It also is widely read, with the third-largest circulation of all U.S. newspapers, following The Wall Street Journal, primarily a business newspaper, and USA Today, a general-interest national newspaper (Mondonewspapers.com, 2010). The Washington Post was chosen because it is the hometown newspaper for Washington, D.C., the center of U.S. government. The Post also has a national reputation for journalistic excellence.

Access World News database was used to locate newspaper articles that ran in the two newspapers during the Alito and Sotomayor hearings in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee and through their confirmation votes in the U.S. Senate. Stories mentioning Sonia Sotomayor were pulled between July 12, 2009, the day her hearings started, and August 7, 2009, the day after she was confirmed. Stories mentioning Samuel Alito were pulled from January 9, 2006, the day his hearings began, and February 1, 2006, the day he was confirmed.  After this process, the stories were cross-referenced with articles between the same dates in the Lexis-Nexis Academic database to ensure all stories in the Post and the Times mentioning Samuel Alito and Sonia Sotomayor between those dates were obtained. A total of 127 articles referring to Alito and 119 referring Sotomayor were collected. Those included not only news stories and opinion columns, but also letters to the editor, editorials, lists of the Senate roll call tallies and brief items. In addition, they included stories that mentioned Alito and/or Sotomayor that did not focus on their confirmation hearings. For example, one story on Monday, January 9, 2006 in The Washington Post Style section profiled a lawyer who headed a conservative group that supported Alito, but the story was about her, not him (Davis, 2006). Such stories were removed from the analysis because they did not pertain directly to the hearings or the nominees. After elimination of the stories that did not focus on the hearings, 113 news texts about Alito and 99 about Sotomayor remained for a textual analysis. They included news stories as well as letters to the editor and sets of letters to the editor (counted as one), briefs, the Senate roll call, transcripts of the hearings, editorials and opinion columns. Photographs were not analyzed. All articles were read and placed into broad categories according to the themes or frames they conveyed. Each article was then reread and the themes were broken down further according to cues and signifiers within the text. The researcher then identified and interpreted the major frames and subtexts the Times and Post journalists used in their coverage of Alito and Sotomayor.  

Results

Several themes emerged from the textual analysis.

The horserace.

Much news media coverage is akin to a horserace. Journalists expend hours reporting and writing and use much ink and web space attempting to predict winners and losers in a particular scenario. However, like a real horserace, this sometimes is difficult or impossible to call. Both the Times and the Post dedicated endless column inches of copy to speculate how each candidate’s approval would influence Supreme Court decisions. Most often, Alito was predicted to tilt the court’s focus to the right and Sotomayor to the left. Although the hearings were not an election, the far most common news frame focused on the political implications, with Democratic and Republican senators dissecting and attacking each nominee’s merits and deficits. Democrats criticized Alito as too conservative to judge fairly and Republicans criticized Sotomayor as too liberal. Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy declared Alito was “anti-black, anti-disabled and anti-women” (Babington, 2006).  Republicans used Sotomayor’s “wise Latina” comment to insinuate she was biased. Ironically, they also criticized statements she made about bringing empathy to the court as “more akin to politics. And politics has no place in the courtroom” (Baker & Lewis, 2009). Apparently politics had plenty of places in the Senate hearing room.

Stories also predicted Alito would vote to strike down Roe vs. Wade, the 1972 case in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld legal abortion. The New York Times ran a piece noting that Democrats saw Alito’s confirmation as “putting an enduring conservative ideological imprint on the nation’s judiciary,” the political makeup of Congress, the White House and public opinion (Nagourney, 2006).  However, those predictions did not exactly come true. Just two years later, Barack Obama, a Democrat, was elected president. And four years later in 2010, Roe vs. Wade was still the law of the land.

Conservatives quoted in the newspaper stories portrayed Sotomayor as an “activist” judge who would allow her gender and ethnicity to influence her decisions. Other articles focused on political support for each nominee, characterizing conservatives, the religious right and Republicans as aligned with Alito and liberals and Democrats aligned with Sotomayor, although the Supreme Court is nonpartisan. Stories also delved into each judge’s opinions, writings and speeches, gauging how each would vote on various issues, including abortion, the death penalty, affirmative action, gun rights and executive power. As each hearing began, stories repeatedly quoted each nominee insisting he or she would rule on cases impartially and neutrally, as judges are expected to do. At no point in the hearings did either nominee reveal his or her political stances on any issue. To clarify, the Times ran more than one story describing how recent Supreme Court nominees have been coached to steer away from political topics, to “sound as if you know what you are talking about but avoid saying anything” (Lewis, 2009; Liptak, 2009).

            The biggest political news out of the Sotomayor hearings appeared to be the fact that one Judiciary Committee member, Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, broke party ranks and voted for her confirmation. [1] Graham even told her during the hearings, “Unless you have a complete meltdown, you’re going to get confirmed” (Lewis, 2009). But even this reporting offered no real insights on how Sotomayor would perform as a judge.

Personality

Reporters tried to dissect each nominee’s personality. Many of the articles portrayed Alito as a dull character. The New York Times described him as “shy and serious, prone to spending long hours in case files” and as a family man who left a job in the Washington, D.C., Reagan administration because he wanted to raise his children in New Jersey, his home state. Stories also contrasted him with U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, with whom he worked in the early 1980s Justice Department and who was confirmed four months previously. Roberts “was handsome and funny” compared with Alito, wrote David D. Kirkpatrick in the Times (2006). One Washington Post story contended Alito’s hearings were dry compared with those of “the witty, charming and erudite John G. Roberts Jr.” (Milbank, 2006). In fact, the Alito portrayed by the Post was downright wooden: “While senators delivered their speeches, Alito sat unnaturally still, feet flat on the ground, elbows on armrests, hands in lap, wearing an expressionless face” (Milbank, 2006). Other Post stories maintained the public was interested in more pressing issues than the Alito hearings and reported senators nearly fell asleep in the hearing room (Balz, 2006; Milbank, January 10, 2006). In the Times, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham was quoted ranking Alito an “eight” compared with Roberts’ ten (Kirkpatrick, 2006). And Times writer Charles Isherwood (2006) noted the hearings’ lack of drama and the constrained nature of recent Supreme Court nominees , writing that Alito could be cast in the role of “The Man With Few Opinions of His Opinions.” However, Kirkpatrick pointed out that Alito’s “low key, almost shy demeanor” worked to his advantage because it made it difficult for Democrats to attack him.

While Alito’s emotions were downplayed, several stories focused on the emotions of his wife, Martha-Ann Alito. On the second day of testimony she left the hearing room after Lindsey Graham defended her husband against accusations of bigotry.  The Post reported that Martha-Ann Alito “stood up, tissue in hand, and rushed to the back of the room, where Capitol Police whisked away the tearful woman” (Milbank, January 11, 2006). A follow-up story in the Post’s Style section dissected the incident, concluding that “the crying wife is sacrosanct, an argument-ender, and more than a little retrograde” (Copeland, 2006). The Post’s David Broder noted that when Martha-Ann Alito cried, her husband “became the sympathetic character in this drama” (Broder, 2006). In the Times, Isherwood (2006) speculated that Martha-Ann Alito actually may have been driven to leave the hearing room because of “grinding boredom.”

            Some parts of the hearings contained controversy. Democrats grilled Alito about his membership in a group, Concerned Alumni of Princeton, that in the 1970s denounced admission of women and minorities to the prestigious university. Alito insisted he did not remember joining, although it was listed on his 1985 resume (Russakoff, 2006). The Times ran an editorial stating that Alito’s explanation was “hard to believe” and questioning his honesty (The New York Times, 2006). Alito also testified that he was drawn to conservatism in part because of early 1970s activism by his Princeton peers and professors. He said he observed at the institution “some very smart people and very privileged people behaving irresponsibly” (Cave, 2006).     

In contrast to the supposedly dull Alito, Sotomayor was portrayed in Post articles as “a confident and mature woman” who laughed, used her hands to communicate and put her hands congenially on the shoulders of the male Judiciary Committee members (Gerhart, 2009). On the other hand, the Times wrote of her “forced silence” to avoid any pot-stirring (Stolberg, 2009). Maureen Dowd (2009)noted that Sotomayor suppressed her emotions when testifying before the primarily male Judiciary Committee: “the Bronx Bomber kept a robotic mask in place.” When male senators asked a series of questions about Sotomayor’s temperament (her previous speeches were described as “passionate” and colleagues said she ran a “hot bench” in her courtroom), both Dowd and the Post’s Kathleen Parker cried foul. Quipped Parker: “Here is what women hear when men ask a female candidate about her temperament, ‘Are you really the bitch everybody says you are?’” 

Other stories took a more lighthearted approach to Sotomayor’s personality, pointing out her affection for Nancy Drew novels as a girl and her admiration of the TV lawyer Perry Mason. 

Ethnic background

Sotomayor’s previous comment about being a “wise Latina” dominated much of the coverage, so much so that the phrase became cliche. Sotomayor backed off from the statement during the hearings, saying she regretted her earlier words. In her first day of testimony, Sotomayor explained that she made the comment not to insinuate that her life experiences made her better to judge a case, but “to inspire young Hispanics, Latino students and lawyers to believe that their life experiences added value to the process” (Goldstein, Barnes and Kane, 2009).  Newspaper coverage speculated that she distanced herself from the statement as part of a strategy to reveal as little of herself as possible. In fact, in the Times, Harvard Law School professor Laurence Tribe said the hearings revealed “nothing” about her legal views (Savage, Baker, Liptak & Bennett, 2009).

The Post ran a column from Sotomayor’s former Princeton professor, Peter Winn, who tried to clarify the “wise Latina” comment. Winn discussed Sotomayor’s early 1970s experiences as a Latina in Princeton’s “WASP culture,” her growth as a writer and scholar, and how she inspired him to teach Latino studies, in which he now is an expert. “Personally, I view the comment as a reference to the enriching impact of her life experiences on her work as a judge,” he wrote (Winn, 2009).  Nearly every Times story about Sotomayor noted that her parents were from Puerto Rico, that she grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx and that her mother raised her alone after her father died when she was 9. The Times characterized Sotomayor’s background in her own words: as “uniquely American” (Baker & Lewis, 2009) and interviewed summer school students at the school Sotomayor attended as a child in the Bronx. “Sometimes I think, ‘What if I am sitting at the same desk she sat in?” commented one student (Fernandez, 2009).

The Post ran a story about Latinos attending the hearings to show support and pride for the first Hispanic Supreme Court nominee (Montgomery & Kilpatrick, 2009) and another about Latino response to her confirmation. “Can you imagine the message this is sending to all the women of the United States?” one source was quoted as asking (Aizenman, 2009). The Times ran a reaction story the day after her Senate confirmation quoting Puerto Rican residents of New York proud that one of their own ascended to the high court (Gonzalez, 2009).

            Some articles pointed out that Sotomayor’s nomination shattered the notion that only white males have power in U.S. government. Post columnist Eugene Robinson asked whether the Republican Party would continue “tying its fortunes to an anachronistic claim of white male exceptionalism and privilege” (Robinson, 2009). Robinson also noted the hypocrisy of criticizing Sotomayor for her reference to her background when none was offered for Alito’s statement about his background as the son of Italian immigrants. “Everyone has a unique personal history,” Robinson wrote.       

Much less was written about Alito’s comments on his ethnic background. Some coverage mentioned his ethnicity as an Italian-American and as a white male but not nearly to the extent Sotomayor’s status as a Latina was emphasized. The Times covered Alito’s statement on the first day of his hearings, in which he spoke of “his father’s arrival from Italy as an infant” (Kirkpatrick, January 10, 2006). Several other Times stories identified him as “the son of an Italian immigrant.” However, the Post did not even mention Alito’s statement about his background as the son of immigrants could influence his decisions.

Gender roles

Alito replaced a white woman, Sandra Day O’Connor, on the bench, and Sotomayor replaced a white male, David Souter. The Post compared Alito’s background with O’Connor’s, insinuating that his background as a white, ethnic male who attended an Ivy League university in the turbulent early 1970s impelled him to become a conservative as a means to counter the changing landscape of the time.  “Alito’s arrival on the Supreme Court would mean that, in place of a 75-year-old Western woman who grew up on a cattle ranch, met with gender discrimination in her first job search, and then served as a state legislator and trial court judge, the court will be adding a white ethnic male from the industrial Northeast who has spent the past 15 years in the wonkish world of the federal appellate bench” (Lane, 2006). However, the other stories did not specifically point out Alito’s male status.

On the other hand, Sotomayor’s femaleness was a major topic of stories, many of which pointed out she would be the third woman on the Supreme Court.  Sotomayor attended Princeton at a time when both women and minorities were rare at the university, while Alito was part of the male culture there. However, each nominee employed a network of mentors to ascend through the ranks. The day before the hearings began, the Post ran a long feature portraying Sotomayor as a Princeton outsider who bonded with a “band of misfits.” She later evolved into a brilliant judge mentored by mainly male, but some female, role models who pushed her to succeed (Goldstein, 2009). The article also highlighted how she had turned to fellow Puerto Ricans for advice and help. Times columnist David Brooks tackled Sotomayor’s experiences by describing her life as a classic story of rising from the bottom to the top, but with more complications. She is, he wrote, someone “who worked hard and contributes profoundly to society but who also sacrificed things along the way” (Brooks, 2009). He attributed much of her success to her extended family and mentors: “Her ascent wasn’t a maverick change against the establishment. Instead, at each phase, her talents were noticed by a well-placed member of that establishment—a famous professor, a revered D.A., a partner at an elite firm. She was elevated and guided” (Brooks, 2009). Brooks also blamed the breakup of Sotomayor’s marriage and a later relationship breakup as the consequences of her “workaholism.” He wrote that these traits provide a glimpse into a high-achieving lifestyle. However, his column failed to discuss high-achieving male judges, apparently implying that only high-achieving women have commitment problems.

The day before Sotomayor’s hearings began, the Times ran a lengthy magazine piece on the only woman remaining on the Supreme Court, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who candidly replied when asked how she felt: “I feel that I don’t have to be the lone woman around this place.” Ginsburg added that having only one woman on the court (after O’Connor’s departure) gave the public “the wrong perception of the court” (Bazelon, 2009). The author, Emily Bazelon, noted that in Ginsburg’s own 1993 hearings, she had said she hoped soon to see three or four women on the court. “My prediction was right for the Supreme Court of Canada,” Ginsburg quipped in the 2009 story. More revelations from Ginsburg included a defense of Sotomayor’s “wise Latina” comment: “All of our differences make the conference better”; her thoughts on how women judges might rule differently from men in discrimination cases: “the women will relate to their own experiences”; and the fact that she, like Sotomayor, is a product of affirmative action: “I was the first tenured woman at Columbia.”

            Lifestyle sections have long been relegated the “women’s section” of the newspaper and apparently the Post believes its women readers are keenly interested in fashion, even the clothing choices of Supreme Court nominees. During each nominee’s hearings, the Post’s Style section published analysis from Robin Givhan, Pulitzer Prize-winning fashion critic, on each nominee. The story on the “unremarkable” Alito actually focused much more on his wife’s wardrobe than his own. Givhan (2006) made some snarky comments about Mary-Ann Alito’s wardrobe, including that her clothing “seemed to be coordinated with a rigor more commonly found in Garanimals” and describing her suit made of fabric similar to “the upholstery that once covered La-Z-Boys.” A letter to the editor condemned Givhan’s criticism of Mary-Ann Alito as “at best, tasteless and, at worst, malicious” (Stukey, 2006).

            In 2009, Givhan’s fashion article on Sotomayor criticized her wardrobe as dated and unfeminine “like a high school principal” but acknowledged it was “safe and guarded.”  Givhan pointed out in the Sotomayor piece that Alito also dressed in an “unremarkable” way for his hearings but that his wife dressed “like a PTA mom turned peacock” (Givhan, 2009).

Discussion and conclusions        

Not surprisingly, the Post and the Times most commonly employed the horserace frame, a classic approach to news, to construct their coverage about the Alito and Sotomayor confirmation hearings. The newspapers devoted a great deal of text to reporters’ predictions on hoe each nominee might influence the court if approved, how senators on the judiciary committee might vote, how arguments between senators affected the mood of the hearings, what confrontational questions senators asked nominees and other back-and-forth chatter. But what news value does this sort of coverage really provide? Not much in the way of useful information. Covering the horserace aspect does not tell the reader much about the nominees or how qualified they are to do the job. In fact, the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings provided more of a forum for senators to grandstand rather than for the public to learn about the nominees. Several stories described the coaching Supreme Court nominees receive to reveal little to nothing about their philosophies or opinions on any issues. In fact, the most recent nominee to the court, Elena Kagan, once called these hearings a “farce” (Epps, 2010). So reporters covering the hearings were left with daily space to fill and only an old formula to rehash.

The Post’s and Times’ attempts to delve into the nominee’s personalities revealed little as well. The coverage of Alito described him as dull, but reporters in the hearings could not gain much insight into his character from watching him give non-answers to senators’ questions. In fact, in search of a speck of action, writers for the Times and the Post leapt onto the fact that Martha-Ann Alito cried at one point in the hearings, portraying it as a moment of great drama. Stories dissected her actions and speculated on its meaning, when in reality the news value of her emotional display essentially was nil. Sotomayor’s personality analysis by the newspapers revealed only a bit more than Alito’s, with the papers portraying her as amiable but also playing up some senators’ allegations of a “temperament” problem, which Post columnist Kathleen Parker summed up as an attempt to portray her as a difficult woman.

The ethnicity frame revealed the most interesting newspaper characterizations. The newspapers generally cast Sotomayor in the role of “the other” –- a Latina who defied norms and expectations. Her story of a child of Puerto Ricans growing up in the Bronx was framed as a classic Horatio Alger success tale with a twist. Several writers went out of their way to insinuate Sotomayor’s success was not all her own; that she received help from others of her ethncity who held power. Yet, as much as her “wise Latina” statement was played up in the news, Alito’s statement about his ethnicity was played down. A few stories mentioned his heritage as an Italian-American, but mainly as an attempt to explain why he had become a conservative against the radical backdrop of the late 1960s and early 1970s. While Sotomayor was portrayed in the coverage as an outsider and a “first,” Alito held the inside track as the norm: the white, middle-aged male expected for a Supreme Court nominee. To their credit, Post columnists Kathleen Parker and Eugene Robinson pointed out the hypocrisy of senators’ and others’ categorizing Sotomayor as a challenger to the status quo rather than accepting her as a legitimate nominee.

Some of the coverage even belittled Sotomayor by insinuating her success was not all her own.  David Brooks’ Times column noted that (male) mentors had “guided” her. No such column framed Alito as the product of others’ help. He was described in the coverage as a self-made man, although he clearly had help mentors from the start of his career. Columns by Parker in the Post and Maureen Dowd in the Times condemned the senators’ questions about Sotomayor’s temperament and the statement by Lindsey Graham that she would be confirmed unless she had a “meltdown,” a word unlikely to be used in association with a male.

The Times faced the gender issue head-on it is interview with current Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg, who candidly pointed out that the lack of women on the court created “the wrong perception.” Brooks’ column also addressed it by discussing Sotomayor’s status as single and childless, and writing that powerful women often must sacrifice marriage and children to succeed in the legal field. However, it should be noted that little of Alito’s personal life and work habits were discussed and no stories questioned how he was able to succeed with a marriage and children. Apparently it was assumed that his wife took care of everything outside of work for him. Martha-Ann Alito became part of the coverage when she cried, but also when the Post’s Givhan opted to critique her wardrobe. The ridiculous Givhan fashion columns on the nominees focused much more on Martha-Ann than her husband, yet none of Sotomayor’s relatives were critiqued, except a reference to her mother “clutching her purse” in the hearing room. There was no fashion coverage of Sotomayor’s stepfather, brother, sister-in-law, nieces and nephews, who also attended the hearings, so the coverage of Martha-Ann Alito’s outfits appeared petty and stereotypical. 

In short, the U.S.’s elite newspapers fell into the same constructed news frames so often employed in news media. Some of the profile stories gave readers an in-depth look at the nominees, but overall the coverage sent a message that the hearings were politics as usual. More disturbingly, much of the newspapers’ Sotomayor coverage resorted to old gender and ethnic stereotypes that cast her in the role of “the other” while Alito, the white male, was considered the norm. This type of coverage helps to uphold the power status quo in America and does little to advance women’s and minorities’ equity. To their credit, some of the columnists, notably Park, Robinson and Dowd, pointed out this dichotomy and some of the readers who wrote letters to the editors did as well. Their writings helped to balance the unfounded and sexist attacks by others in the media, including Limbaugh, Rove and Liddy.

Future research in this area will examine news coverage of the most recent Supreme Court nominee, Elena Kagan, whose Senate Judiciary hearings took place in July 2010.

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[1]As a side note, Senator Lindsey Graham also broke party ranks on July 20, 2010 by voting to confirm Elena Kagan, Obama’s second female nominee to the Supreme Court.

Family friendly? A study of the work-family balance in journalism

Tracy Everbach, Ph.D., is an associate professor of journalism at the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas. Her research focuses on gender in journalism and in newsrooms. This paper was presented at the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication Convention in Chicago, Ill., August 2008.

Family friendly? A study of the work-family balance in journalism

Tracy Everbach

Journalism has long been labeled as a profession unfriendly to families. Journalists often work irregular schedules, long hours and holidays. They must be prepared to change plans at a moment’s notice to cover a story. Since women usually assume primary responsibility for children and/or elderly and ill relatives, women journalists face challenges juggling families and work. Some female journalists eventually decide to leave the profession because of family responsibilities.

Male journalists also are concerned about balancing work and family. More women have entered the workforce during the past three decades, making men less likely to have a stay-at-home spouse. The traditional role of women staying home with children has become a relic of the past. While in 1950, 20.7 percent of women worked outside the home, by 2006, 59 percent of women participated in the workforce (Goldin, 2003; U.S. Census Bureau, 2009). More women are in the workforce in part because the feminist movement of the 1970s helped open women’s role in the society’s public sphere. More women desire careers than in the past, but many women have no choice but to work for economic reasons (Fels, 2004). Women often work a “second shift” when they arrive home from their jobs because they tend to take primary responsibility for childcare and domestic duties. Women more often than men find themselves in the position of having to choose between work and family (Fels, p. 238).

This study of female and male journalists asks the research question: How do journalists balance their work with their family lives?

It focuses primarily on women and men who have child-care responsibilities and work in the print and broadcast journalism fields.

            Much media attention has been devoted in recent years to women’s “opting out” of the workforce for family reasons. Lisa Belkin coined the opt-out term in a 2003 New York Times Magazine story about well-educated women who chose to leave their high-paying careers to care for children (Belkin, 2003). Some feminists, notably E.J. Graff in a Columbia Journalism Review article, call the opting-out phenomenon a myth (Graff, 2007). Graff argued that this so-called movement is nothing new; that news media have for many decades reported “trends” of women quitting careers to stay home. Graff noted that in more than 70 percent of American families with children, all adults work outside the home. Women are pressured culturally to choose between work and family and some choose family because most workplaces do not support mothers. However, those who opt out make up only 8 percent of working women and consist mainly of “white, highly educated, in well-paying professional/managerial jobs” (Graff, 2007). Other women cannot afford to choose between work and family.

            Some mothers who leave their jobs feel they are forced out—without a choice—because of workplace inflexibility, according to “Opt Out” or Pushed Out?, a 2006 study by the Hastings College of the Law at the University of California (Williams, Manvell, and Bornstein, 2006).  The study outlined an ideal worker stereotype embraced by many industries: “Someone who starts to work in early adulthood and works, full time and full force, for forty years straight” (p. 8). That formula, the study noted, is incompatible with the lives of women and men who want to be involved in family life. The authors concluded that women leave the workforce because of an outdated, inflexible workplace structure and because of bias against mothers. Many women who try to return to the workforce after taking time off for family find they have lost career status (Williams, et al., p. 15).

            Graff identified “today’s feminist frontier” as “the bias against mothers that remains embedded on the job, in the culture and at home” (Graff, 2007). In addition, fathers who want to devote time to caring for children and family also face opposition and bias. Graff argued the so-called opt-out revolution actually is a factor of the economy, which has stalled since 2000. All women, not only those with children, have seen workforce participation stall because an economic slowdown. Men’s economic household contributions also have leveled off with the economy (Williams, et al., pp. 20-21). In the meantime, women still assume the majority of household work, although men have begun to take on more chores and childcare duties (Williams, et al., p. 23).

            Other studies have shown younger people focus their lives less on work than older generations do. Generation & Gender, a 2004 study by the Families and Work Institute, noted that “most American workers today are rejecting the work-centric style of their father’s workplace” (Families and Work Institute, 2004, p. 6). In the study, 80 percent of college-educated employees reported they would like to work fewer hours. The study also found workers have become more family-focused, particularly fathers. Men of Generation X and Generation Y (also known as millennials) have changed attitudes on women’s and men’s work and traditional gender roles. The study defined Generation Y as those born 1980 and after, Generation X as those born 1965-1979 and Baby Boomers born 1945-1964. Rather than opting out of work to care for children, Generations X and Y are more likely to have a “downtrend in career ambitions” (p. 5). “Very sizeable numbers of women and men are working hard, but not willing to make the trade-offs required by advancing into jobs with more responsibility,” the Generation & Gender study found (p. 19). This does not mean that these generations eschew hard work—in fact, they work more hours than employees three decades ago—but they desire more balance in their lives (p. 29).

            Differences among the generations were clear:

·Younger people (Generations X and Y) are more focused on family priorities than the Baby Boomers.

 ·Generation X fathers spend more time daily with their children than Baby Boomer dads.

·Women tended change their focus from work to family as they aged, while men did not. This follows the traditional family model, in which women take on the majority of family and home responsibilities.

·In families with working women, men take on more work in the home than in past decades (pp. 8-14).

            Newsrooms have reputations for not accommodating families. A 2005 survey of 700 journalists by the Poynter Institute found that while journalists reported high levels of work satisfaction, they felt their family lives suffered because of job demands (Geisler, 2005).  Sixty-five percent of the journalists said they worked more than 40 hours per week and 47.2 percent said they seriously considered leaving the field. Most likely to consider leaving were young people, women and people of color. The survey also showed women and minorities who had asked for accommodations to balance work and personal life were less likely than others to see the request granted. Journalists also reported that immediate supervisors had a large effect on job satisfaction, depending on how flexible the supervisor was about work-life balance. Slightly more than half said their supervisors were unsupportive concerning work-life balance (Geisler, 2005).

The journalism industry has suffered in recent years from an economic downturn, forcing media organizations to lay off employees and offer buyouts. The result is fewer journalists working longer hours to report news on the 24-hour schedule the market demands. Newspapers have fewer readers, new technology has caused an emphasis on online journalism, and advertising revenues have dropped. Journalism scholars Pamela J. Creedon and Judith Cramer note that in twenty-first century’s first decade, the journalism profession has become a less attractive option for both women and men (Creedon & Cramer, 2007). They cite “rapid changes in technology, increased demands to work longer for the same pay, coupled with eroding family-friendly practices” as factors driving both sexes away from the profession (p. 278). A 2007 study found women leave journalism mainly because of schedule inflexibility, low pay, a disregard for women’s news interests and a lack of mentoring or encouragement (Everbach & Flournoy, 2007). The study suggested journalism organizations do not understand employees’ needs, particularly women’s.

Since the feminist movement of the 1970s, women have entered American society’s public sphere in greater numbers than ever. But they find themselves still primarily responsible for private sphere tasks. While working full-time jobs, they continue to also work as children’s primary caregivers and main household caretakers. The feminist movement opened doors in the workplace but continued to keep them closed at home.  This study examines how female and male journalists balance their public and private lives in the journalism industry’s current climate of change.

Methodology

            Twenty-six female and male journalists were interviewed in January, February and March 2008. The interview subjects were promised anonymity and their employers’ identities were kept confidential, allowing them speak freely without retaliation concerns.

All interview subjects were asked the same questions developed from the literature review. The interviewers asked mainly open-ended questions so the subjects could expound on points, the interviewers could listen to the answers and could ask follow-up questions. The interview subjects consisted of sixteen women and ten men who at some point in their careers had balanced work and caring for children or other relatives. The women’s ages ranged from 27 to 57 and they had worked in journalism between four and thirty-seven years. The men’s ages ranged from 29 to 51 and they worked in journalism between three and twenty-three years. The majority was Caucasian, but two of the women and two of the men were African American and one woman and one man were Hispanic. They worked for newspapers, magazines, wire services and in radio. The interview subjects were recruited through postings on e-mail listservs for professional journalism organizations asking for volunteers. Some subjects were recruited through a snowball method from members of the listservs, meaning the members asked others they knew to volunteer. All in-depth interviews were by telephone and lasted from 30 to 60 minutes. The researchers transcribed all answers. The subjects lived and worked in various areas of the United States, including the East Coast, Midwest, South, Southwest and West Coast.

The interview transcripts were examined for overall themes and for patterns that led to interpretation and meaning of subjects’ answers. The interview method also provided rich detail of the subjects’ answers. The results were intended to better understand journalists and their experiences balancing work and family.

Results

The interview responses indicated that women journalists continue to assume most responsibility for childcare, even while working high-pressure, time-consuming journalism jobs. After having children, some female journalists accepted jobs on the night shift, others switched to positions they didn’t necessarily want but offered more regular hours, and some took part-time or freelancing positions with less pay and prestige. Several female journalists described a juggling act that left them with little time between work and childcare to handle household chores, participate in outside activities or spend time with spouses. (All ages mentioned in the text represent the age of the subject when interviewed.)

Female Journalist No. 1, whose husband also is a journalist, said after they had two children, she watched his career take off while hers stagnated. At age 50 with two teenagers, she works as a newspaper reporter.

The decision was made that I would primarily take care of the children. He was able to continually advance and has worked his way up to deputy managing editor. I have molded my schedule to fit my children’s for their entire lives. Instead of going after an editing position, I went back to reporting. I’m the one who drives them to appointments, that kind of thing. I’ve always taken jobs like general assignments. I knew I couldn’t do other jobs and take care of the kids (personal communication, February 18, 2008).

Several female journalists echoed her sentiments. They said they watched male colleagues pursue careers without having to assume childcare duties. They noted a double standard in newsrooms that assumes women are caregivers. Female Journalist No. 2 noted, “Guys can leave for their kids’ soccer game and they’re great dads. Women leave and it’s like, there she goes again” (personal communication, February 15, 2008). Female journalists said they had to adopt strict time-management techniques if they wanted to work and have children. Female Journalist No. 3, a 54-year-old wire service editor who covered Capitol Hill when her three children were young, said she volunteered at her child’s kindergarten in the morning then worked into the night covering Congress.

I think it’s just a matter of being really flexible. When I found it didn’t work it was because I had an expectation that couldn’t be met. I had to fix that and just accept what is. I let go of expectations to have a marvelously clean house right away…it takes a lot of calendar management. Every year when they put out the school calendar I go through and write down everything I need to participate in. I write all the doctor’s appointments, all the field trips. I can participate in a workshop in pre-K because they do that at 8:30 in the morning (personal communication, February 29, 2008).

Female Journalist No. 4, a 40-year-old newspaper reporter with a baby, said she has learned to accomplish more work in the office so she can spend more time at home with her son.

I have become a lot more effective when I get in here. I have to work out what I am going to do, how I can make my calls. I just try to get it done so I feel comfortable leaving by 6. I don’t take lunch anymore. I think I am still a good employee, but I am not going to be here still working at night. I am not as available on call for a spur-of-the-moment assignment. It may affect my career because I might be seen as someone not to promote to a higher profile gig, if I wanted to cover city hall or a presidential campaign…The job doesn’t come first anymore (personal communication, February 4, 2008).

About half the female journalists credited their spouses with assuming equal childcare duties. The other half of female journalists said they took most of the responsibility. In contrast, all of the male journalists said their female partners served as the children’s primary caregivers. Most male journalists said their jobs rather than their home life consumed most of their time and energy.

Male Journalist No. 1, a newspaper editor and father of three, described his wife, a stay-at-home mother, as the “CEO” of the household and himself as the “old style breadwinner” (personal communication, March 3, 2008). The 46-year-old journalist said work is a main priority, but his focus has changed over the years. He once quit a job at a national newspaper after only three weeks because his bosses did not value his desire to spend time with his family.  Male Journalist No. 2, a 49-year-old newspaper editor, said bluntly he has not spent as much time with his three children or his wife as he should have (personal communication, February 11, 2008). His job has required him to work during the afternoon and early-evening hours his children have activities. He said he regrets missing family dinners.

When my kids got into school, a lot of stuff happens after school and in the evening and I missed 95 percent of them. The only thing I managed was to take the other time I had, weekends, to spend time with them…My kids have been successful despite my lack of being there at dinner. That has helped me be more confident and accepted by peers. On the other hand, there has been a lot of (family) resentment over the years that I was in a profession that demanded I be away from home from 5-8 p.m. most days. It’s made my kids say the last job they ever would take is journalism (personal communication, February 11, 2008).

Male Journalist No. 3, who left newspaper reporting for magazine editing noted, “Part of the frustration is that with the job of a reporter, the schedules are different. You weren’t getting out until 7 o’clock. For a dad, 7 o’clock doesn’t work. Raising kids is very inconsistent with a reporter’s life and lifestyle” (personal communication, February 1, 2008). The journalist, 42, who has three children, added that most newsrooms are unfriendly to parents. “There’s no place that’s colder,” he said.

Female journalists reported innovative methods of balancing the demands of childcare with their jobs. Female Journalist No. 5, a 32-year-old wire service reporter, 32, described having to FedEx breast milk to her baby daughter when she traveled for work. “I stayed at different hotels on different nights and I had to ask the concierge to put the milk in the freezer until Fed Ex showed up” (personal communication, February 24, 2008). Female Journalist No. 6, a 51-year-old national news correspondent, said she left the Middle East on March 19, 2003, the day the United States invaded Iraq, because she promised her teenage son she would take him on a college tour. “Later I was on a trip with Condi Rice, and I ran into a male reporter I had met over there. He said, ‘I remember you. You left on March 19. You were so brave; you put your family first’” (personal communication, January 30, 2008).

Four of the journalists interviewed were single caregivers to children at some point in their careers. They recounted creative methods of handling work and childcare as single parents. Female Journalist No. 7, a 26-year-old newspaper reporter who became pregnant in college, said she sometimes took her toddler daughter on assignments, including a homicide. Her daughter has spent many shifts in the newsroom. “I have learned to do five million things and have a kid crawling on my back. I have learned not to take on more than I can handle. I have a lot more confidence now” (personal communication, February 11, 2008). Female Journalist No. 8, a single mother, 50, said her newsroom colleagues have helped raise her daughter, as have members of her church. She changed her focus from local reporting to business reporting because the hours are more regular. But she still feels pressure from her bosses not to put her job before her child. She said she has to frame carefully her requests to take time off. “My attitude is, this newspaper has been around for many years and has a lot of people working for it. I have one child and she will be a child for 20 years and I am the only person she has. You don’t want to constantly be saying (to bosses), I have to do this, I have to do that, because you risk being a problem child” (personal communication, March 8, 2008).

Not many news organizations offered formal policies designed to help families, the interview subjects reported. The journalists worked for an array of organizations: large and small newspapers, magazines, radio networks, in various areas of the country. But only a small number said company polices accommodated their family needs. Since the passage of the federal Family and Medical Leave Act in 1993, journalists may advantage of provisions that allow 12 weeks of unpaid leave to new parents, employees with ill relatives or employees with serious health conditions (U.S. Department of Labor, 2008). But few media organizations provided benefits beyond that.

 The majority of journalists interviewed said individual supervisors, not organizations, controlled how much flexibility their jobs offered. Some supervisors easily accommodated journalists’ needs while others resisted any kind of job adaptability. On one hand, the 26-year-old newspaper reporter with a young daughter said her managers had no problem with employees bringing children to the newsroom. They allowed employees to set up the conference room as a playroom. “We all have our stash of Play Dough and dolls and toys. My editor bought a DVD player for us. It’s kind of like a day care without a day care provider” (personal communication, February 11, 2008.) On the other hand, Female Journalist No. 10, a 41-year-old newspaper editor with two children, said that when her children were small, “I was made to feel very guilty and disloyal for taking time off for my kids. I was working up until I went into labor. I was covering a meeting when I went into labor. I finished my story, turned it in, went to my house and then went to the hospital” (personal communication, February 25, 2008). She said she returned to work within a week of the birth.

Several journalists, both female and male, said they did not believe much had changed in newsrooms to help families since the 1970s, when more women began entering journalism. While society is more accepting of working mothers, the journalism world for several of the interview subjects appeared to stagnate. Said Female Journalist No. 8, a single mother and newspaper reporter: “It is a traditionally male-dominated business with male-favoring policies. For as long as it is dominated by men it is going to be very, very slow to change” (personal communication, February 8, 2008). However, Male Journalist No. 4, age 51 with two children, said that with more women in the workplace, news organizations must consider families. “We have a lot more women in management, and they are going to be more aware and accommodating. The increase of women in management has forced newspapers to be more sensitive to the needs of female employees” (personal communication, January 29, 2008.)

Some journalists said changes in technology, such as laptop computers and personal hand-held devices like Blackberries, seem to offer journalists flexibility. But they noted the current downturn in the news media industry’s financial climate has required journalists to work longer hours with smaller staffs. Said Female Journalist No. 1: “I don’t see that there is very much being done in the profession, and particularly now as the financial situation is grim…I think it’s going to get worse for working parents” (personal communication, February 18, 2008). Some journalists said media organizations have become less accommodating of families in the first decade of the twenty-first century after attempts to achieve better work-family balance in the 1990s. Male Journalist No. 7, a 40-year-old newspaper editor with two children said:

I think there is less flexibility than there used to be because organizations are smaller and trying to do more with less. Technology has changed things—people can do stuff from home—so there might be more pressure to do more work. There’s more pressure for everyone to perform than there was five to ten years ago…We are smaller. We are not what we used to be (personal communication, March 2, 2008).

Most of the interview subjects confirmed generational differences in approaches to the work-family balance. Younger male journalists said they were more involved with family than their older counterparts. Several younger men described themselves in “co-parenting” situations, even when their spouses were the primary caregivers. Generation X-age men said they understood a societal expectation that they also contribute to childcare and household chores. Male Journalist No. 10, a 33-year-old newspaper reporter with a toddler, said: “As I look at it, I find people in my generation are into dual parenting, dual household, dual chores. It’s not fair that my wife cook, do the laundry, empty the dishwasher. It’s more egalitarian than my parents’ generation. I have no problem with it all. I get mad at my dad a lot” (personal communication, March 3, 2008). Male Journalist No. 9, a 33-year-old newspaper editor with one child and another on the way, said he has asked his newspaper editors to change his hours so he can be at home at night with his wife after their second child is born. “I have this vision of (his wife) at home at night with a 3-year-old and a baby. I need to be at home to take care of the 3-year-old while she is tending to the newborn” (personal communication, March 10, 2008). Male Journalist No. 5, a 39-year-old newspaper reporter with three children, said younger male journalists seem to be more focused on family than their older counterparts. “I think the reporters who have been here a longer time are more defined by this job than younger reporters. There are people who have spent 25-30 years in the business and because they have given all for this business, they expect you to give all” (personal communication, January 29, 2008). 

Younger women and men are more likely to ask for family accommodations than older ones, forcing more newsrooms to concede some kind of balance, the interview subjects reported. Younger women also are more likely to leave journalism if employers don’t accommodate their needs. Women born in the 1960s and beyond expect to have both careers and families. They also must work because of family expenses, the interview subjects said. Female Journalist No. 10, age 41, noted, “Women get satisfaction from having their own careers and being more independent. It’s so expensive to live and raised a family, so it’s a necessity that both parents work. There is a shift for both of those reasons” (personal communication, February, 25, 2008). Noted Female Journalist No. 2, age 50: “Older women had to hide what they were doing. If they had to bring in kids to work, no one knew about it. We are more open now” (personal communication, February 15, 2008). Some younger female journalists credited women involved in the 1970s feminist movement for breaking ground. Female Journalist No. 9, a magazine editor who co-parents her young brothers with her mother pointed out: “We are reaping the benefits because we are willing to say, ‘I am going to get this balance rather than turning over my job to a man’” (personal communication, March 10, 2008).

Still, several male and female journalists said the media industry has not progressed enough, especially compared with other businesses. Some companies provide more progressive family policies, such as on-site day care, time off children with guarantees employees’ jobs will remain, and offers of part-time work.  Female Journalist No. 15, a 48-year-old radio reporter with three children, maintained:

I am surprised we think of ourselves as such a civilized society and we do such a poor job of taking care of our families. It’s not valued the same way as other things are valued. The main thing it does is that it stresses out the family when there aren’t good (work) accommodations. It’s just building up a psychology of stress within the whole family and it’s really unnecessary (personal communication, February 25, 2008).

Conclusion and recommendations

            Interviews with these working journalists revealed that female journalists are under pressure to juggle work, childcare and household responsibilities. Male journalists, particularly younger men, participate in childcare and home care, but rarely assume primary responsibilities for them. Female journalists are more likely to face a “second shift” of work when they arrive home from their jobs. Also, female journalists tend to sacrifice career moves for family reasons more often than male journalists. Yet this research offered no evidence that many female journalists are leaving the profession to care for children. Instead, they are asking employers to make accommodations for family.

            Individual supervisors rather than company policies greatly influence how much flexibility journalists receive balancing work and family, similar to the results of the Poynter study. Some supervisors go out of their way to accommodate employees, such as the newsroom in which the conference room became a playroom. Other supervisors do not tolerate family demands on work. An individual supervisor may control job satisfaction, the journalists in this study reported. Many of the journalists in this study were concerned about the effects of the current media climate, with leaner staff and more pressing time demands, on the work-family balance. Employer flexibility is not likely to improve during tough economic times.

            Generational differences regarding work and family were evident in this study, with younger journalists more focused on family than older journalists. This paralleled the Generation & Gender research. Younger women are more likely than older women to expect employers to accommodate families. They also are more likely to ask for work arrangements that allow them more time to care for children. In general, Generation X men in journalism were more involved with family than Baby Boomer male journalists. Younger men also were more likely to participate in childcare and housework than older men. Several young male journalists said they adopted a co-parenting philosophy with their spouses.

However, employers do not seem to be keeping pace with their employees’ requests for balance, according to the journalists in this study. Both male and female journalists said they found most media companies unlikely and unwilling to adopt more family-friendly policies. Some organizations made changes in the 1980s and 1990s, but backtracked with the less-prosperous media business climate of the 2000s.  The results of this study indicate that if media companies eliminate family accommodations or fail to offer flexibility, they may drive younger male and female journalists from the profession, particularly those with families or who plan to have families. Balancing work and family clearly is a priority for the newest generation of journalists.

This study was designed to gather detailed, in-depth information on journalists’ experiences balancing work and family. Follow-up studies could include surveys to reach a wider sample of journalists or case studies of individual media organizations.

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