Categories
Women and Political Science

Analyzing Media Coverage of Kamala Harris: A Study of Gendered Frames in US Politics

You will then choose a woman candidate in contemporary US politics (the last five years) and
use information from our textbooks, peer reviewed articles, and other reputable sources.
The goal of this paper is for you to examine the candidate of your choosing through one of the
frames with which we view women in politics.’ We will elaborate on these frames as
the semester moves forward. This paper will serve as an analysis of the frames with which we
view women and the candidate in question.
The length requirement for this paper is 10 pages in APA style.
You will want to reference the section on The Media. The frames include: the mother (the
mammy), the iron maiden (the sapphire), the pet/child, the seductress/sex object (the jezebel).
-Once you choose your candidate you will want to give a little biographical information on them
(please remember that any information that is not an original thought or idea must have an in-
text citation)
-If your candidate has been in office before you will provide information about their political
stances/votes etc.
-You will gather all of the information you can from media sources (please try to use a variety,
print, television journalism, social media)
-From this point you will analyze the coverage of your candidate and see which frame the
coverage fits into (it might fit into more than one frame and that is okay)
-You will complete a literature review of sorts with the content you have gathered and show
the specific points where your candidate is portrayed through a narrow lens (one of those listed
above)
-Wrapping up you can discuss the outcome of your candidate’s election-try to fit in how the
frames through which the media portrays women may have impacted public perception of your
candidate. Did this coverage potentially lead to their win/loss? Why or why not?
The rubric that will be used to grade your paper can be found below: