Women saving the world: Narratives of gender and development on global radio

LeRoux-Rutledge, Emily

Abstract

Radio has long been used as a tool for development – particularly when promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment – but far more attention has been paid to local community radio than to radio with a global reach. This chapter seeks to understand how a far-reaching global radio programme, the BBC’s 100 women series, represents women from low and lower-middle-income countries, and portrays their role in development. Narrative analysis reveals two prominent metanarratives, or frames, in the series: one in which a woman is portrayed as a local phenomenon, and the other in which she is portrayed as a global success. Both frames reproduce a standard development trope, in which women are presented as “saviours” driving development through their community-mindedness and altruism, rather than as ordinary human beings intrinsically entitled to equality.

• Online Publication Date: Jun 18, 2022
• Publication Date: Jun 18, 2022
• Deposit Date: Jun 20, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Jun 20, 2022
• Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
• Book Title: New mediums, better messages? How innovations in translation, engagement, and advocacy are changing international development
• Chapter Number: 7
• ISBN: 9780198858768
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198858751.001.0001
• Keywords: Women, Gender, Radio, International Development, Representation, Narrative, Frame, BBC, 100 women
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/9655465
• Publisher URL: https://fdslive.oup.com/www.oup.com/academic/pdf/openaccess/9780198858751.pdf