Introduction

In this blog, we analyze how reproductive rights are represented in the media. To facilitate this analysis, we must first define the concepts of hegemony and ideology. Hegemony is, as James Lull states, “the power or dominance that one social group holds over the others” (39). In the case of reproductive rights, this primarily concerns the power men hold over women in a largely patriarchal society. This is a power that is reinforced by the production and propagation of ideologies that support the patriarchy. Ideologies are “images, concepts, and premises which provide the frameworks through which we represent, interpret, understand and ‘make sense’ of some aspect of social existence” (Hall 104).  When there are depictions in media of male dominance as a positive concept, it reinforces patriarchal hegemonic powers. Using the principles of media analysis we look for hegemonic and counter-hegemonic ideologies that are embedded in media artifacts from different eras of American media history. Beginning with media in the pre-radio era, we progress to pre-internet media, and then through to modern news, film, and social media depictions of reproductive rights. The paradigm we use for media analysis is based on the work of Douglas Kellner. We use the foundation he lays in the essay Cultural Studies, Multiculturalism, and Media Culture to explore how the media we analyze reaffirms or resists dominant hegemonic ideologies (Kellner). We also look to see how these ideologies shift over time. Is there an unchanging set of values that the hegemony espouses on reproductive rights from the pre-radio era through to modern media? Or are the values from pre-radio and pre-internet anachronistic? By exploring artifacts from various sources of media and various periods in history, we can see how different ideologies are represented across a wide spectrum of media.  

For our exploration of pre-radio media, we analyzed a publication of the Woman Rebel, a publication intended to create a space for voluntary motherhood and the right to use contraceptives. This is one of the most poignant early publications that conveyed a narrative in favor of fertility rights and against the traditional patriarchal narrative. Moving from pre-radio to pre-internet, we also look at the issue of abortion, specifically at how abortion as portrayed in the film Citizen Ruth, a movie about a young, pregnant woman who finds herself as the focal point for a debate between pro-life and pro-choice groups.  Afterwards, we analyze current  Social media and the disbursement of information through Internet. The article highlighted is written by Cyndi Lauper, “Girls Just Want to Have Birth Control,” and is focused on how she combats the Supreme Court's decision to remove Hobby Lobby and other businesses to have to pay for women's contraceptive. This case “Burwell v. Hobby Lobby” was highly controversial. We also analyze the comments of Paul Horwitz “The Hobby Lobby Moment”, and learned just how sticky the case really was, as well as the support given by “Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.”. Gloria Anzaldua’s “Borderlands La Frontera” gives us a great representation of the hegemonic narratives at play in our country. Her outlook supported the empowerment of women and choice. Following the analysis of social media, we analyze film and TV shows,  specifically “Knocked Up (2007),” “Trapped” (2016) and an episode of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” As in many of the other forms of media discussed previously, these forms of media present several of the commonly reinforced hegemonic narratives regarding abortion and reproductive rights. These include the condemnation/shaming of women who support/pursue abortion, the downplaying of the emotional turmoil that both partners experience during an unplanned pregnancy, and the concealment of the often blunt, aggressive pushback women experience from their peers, family members, and members of their community.  Lastly, we move into the current news portion were the women's march on Washington will be analyzed. The women's march took place after President Donald Trumps inauguration. The march had both negative and positive feedback from people all around the world, but a lot people thought the march was pointless and was only a anti Trump march. but this was only the case because people still lack knowledge of what being a feminist or pro- women really means. This part of the project will detangle what it  means to be a feminist in a dominantly male world.