Metaphors and misrepresentation - Gendered mediation in news coverage of the 1993 Canadian leaders' debates

The concept of gendered mediation represents a new phase in the study of wo men, politics, and the media. It focuses on the stereotypically masculine n arrative used in political reporting. Metaphors of warfare and confrontatio n dominate media coverage of politics, reinforcing traditional conceptions of politics as a male preserve. In this article, we examine the implication s of this narrative for the coverage of female leaders. We argue that women who adopt "masculine" styles in order to compete are portrayed by the medi a as being more aggressive than their male counterparts because they are co ntravening deeply rooted conventions concerning appropriate female behavior . By comparing metaphoric reconstructions of the 1993 Canadian leaders' deb ates with the actual behavior of the participants, we show that television news coverage of the two female leaders focused disproportionately on the b ehavior that was counter to gender-based stereotypes. Ironically, even when the women adopted a less confrontational approach, they were still portray ed as being more aggressive than the male participants. The result of this gendered mediation, we conclude, was to misrepresent the behavior of both o f the female leaders.