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Clay Chastain
Dr. Henderson
COMM 3326
12 December 2007
Gender and Race in Situation Comedies
INTRODUCTION
Throughout many decades in television in the United States, situation comedies,
or sitcoms, have shown many trends; some of these, including the appearance and
representation of different genders and races, seem to follow almost pattern-like trends
that reinforce common stereotypes present in our society. However, of these trends, the
representation of African Americans and women from the 1950’s to 1990’s will be the
focus of this analysis, namely the inaccuracies produced by their place in sitcoms.
FINDINGS
Racial Presence, 50's - 90's
Other/Unknown
African Americans
Caucasian
Figure 1
From the media study results, several key points of data have been revealed. The
first set of data serves as an introduction to the racial division of sitcoms. This chart,
displayed above, is a basic breakdown of the races show in all of the sitcoms of the study;
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as can be seen, Caucasians are the largest group throughout the entire time period
researched. It is overwhelmingly conclusive from the sample size that the next sizable
group, African Americans, represents only a small portion of the chart (13.7%). Beyond
this, all of the other groups are combined together, reaching a similarly small amount
(5.3%).
African Americans & Caucasians per
Apperance
60
40
African Americans
20
Caucasians
0
50's 60's 70's 80's 90's
Figure 2
The next finding details the split between each individual character appearance in terms
of the two most prominent races, African American and Caucasian. As is apparent, this
shows the lack of congruity between the two races through the decades. Even though
numbers have risen from the 50’s and 60’s, the data still shows an obvious gap in
programming with equal displays of race.
African Americans & Caucasians by Family Structure in %
20
15
10
African Americans
5
Caucasians
0
Traditional
Family
Extended
Family
Nontraditional
Family
Figure 3
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In this chart, another stereotype of sorts is displayed: family structure. It is shown that
while African Americans and Caucasians both have similar traditional family
percentages, the extended and non-traditional are exceedingly common with African
Americans – much more so than the Caucasians which are not above 3%.
Men & Women by Boss in
Workplace
Men
Women
Figure 4
Another finding to be addressed is the role of women in the workplace. Overwhelmingly,
men dominate the positions of power in sitcoms with almost 80% of the leadership roles
assigned exclusively to them.
Men & Women by Various Activities
20
15
Men
10
Women
5
0
Smoking
Drinking
Betting
Punishing
Nuturing
Crying
Figure 5
This data is a combination of several different behaviors to get a sample of some
stereotypically more gendered actions. While for the most part the expected yield of
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women having less of all of these, except nurturing and crying, was a valid assumption,
some of the data was close in comparison.
FINDING 1: Racial Presence, 50’s – 90’s
From the results of this finding, it seems that the data correlates with almost every
other piece of data on a similar subject. It is apparent that African Americans and other
minorities compose, pointedly, a minority of the character appearance in the study. Of
course, due to the fact that minorities are a growing number of people in society, much
larger than as is represented by the sitcom graph, it seems reasonable to say that there are
fewer minorities than should be to give a fair representation of the actual demographic
split in the United States. Most obviously, if the goal is to produce an equal amount
between all different races, this graph indicates the failure of sitcoms to do so in a dismal
fashion. As for the initial claim that African Americans are inaccurately represented, this
basic overlying chart seems to suggest that the claim is true; it is overwhelmingly
reasonable to say that the presence of minorities of all groups is a second thought to the
presence of Caucasians which compose so much of the broadcasting world mainstay.
Perhaps this data radically changes when broken down by individual decade, but this is
not the case as we will see. If anything, this broad overview of the racial difference
should be an important benchmark to gauge how far sitcom broadcasting must go to
improve the issue of minority presence. From my own study (Fresh Prince of Bel-Air),
over 80% of the characters coded were African American, a gross reversal of the data
shown here.
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FINDING 2: African Americans & Caucasians per Appearance
Because of the data collected from the first finding, it seemed to be relevant to
break down the initial finding further into decades, perhaps in the attempt to better
explain why the percentage of appearances of African Americans were so low. However,
upon compiling the data, it became obvious that even though the distribution increased
for African Americans over time, it hardly came close to an equal percentage. In fact,
from the study, it could be said that African American percentage has dropped since the
1980’s to the 1990’s. Whether this will hold true into the 2000’s is, of course, unknown,
but should be an interesting note that perhaps may indicate even more need for immediate
change in the racial structure of broadcast sitcoms. If anything, what the data do show
clearly is that African American representation has increased significantly over the
decades. From the 50’s to 90’s, the difference is fifteen appearances, up from one to
sixteen. In terms of this, although African American representation is relatively small, the
number does show some improvement. Assumedly, the reason for this increase follows
the acceptance level of shows involving African Americans into popular culture. Where
in the 50’s this statistic was very low, seemingly over time, African American culture
became more acceptable in mainstream media. Yet, even though improvements have
been made to the number of African American appearances, they are nowhere close to
the level of Caucasians, which should be an indicator for change in the future.
FINDING 3: African Americans & Caucasians by Family Structure in %
In this finding, the results of family structure data compiled into a bar graph, it is
evident that there is a large chasm between that of African Americans and Caucasians in
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portrayal of family life. While the graph depicts that traditional families are very similar
in number, the difference between extended and non-traditional families is severe at best.
Even with the data from the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s, a time of sitcoms based on family
structures that did not necessarily fit into the traditional family mold, it seems that this
was not enough to increase the totals enough to offset the stereotypes. Despite the lack of
demographic data of the United States, it is reasonable to say that these statistics are a
gross misinterpretation of stereotypes, assuming the African Americans compose this
much of the non-traditional and extended families. Together, the data would show that a
majority of African Americans live in families other than the traditional family, which,
assumedly, is an incorrect statement and a stereotype on part of broadcast producers
throughout the decade. Regardless of the menial truth a stereotype holds in reality, it is
the requirement of broadcasters to correct errors and further the portrayal of minorities in
a less stereotypical way; as such, it should be important that these incongruities between
races are mended in the extent that they begin to even the data in the future.
FINDING 4: Men & Women by Boss in Workplace
As can be clearly seen in this simple chart, women in business leadership
positions significantly differ from those of men in the same positions. While both do
indeed have leadership positions, it seems that sitcoms represent women in such a way
that fewer are shown, or deemed capable characters, for the role of a boss in any
workplace. Although not surprising considering the actual treatment of women in a maledominated working environment in the United States, it is probably not a helpful choice
to represent women as characters of lesser power when realistically the claim should be
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untrue. Of course, perhaps this trend of power positions being filled by men will slowly
equalize itself with time, but it is up to the broadcasters to take this into consideration
when producing a show. Whether or not television is an accurate picture of gender roles,
it is debatable to suggest that the data shown in this study is a good representation of
women. Certainly, this data helps only to reinforce the stereotypes show throughout the
American workplace, so it should be a prerogative to correct this viewpoint in broadcast
media as well. Again, the existing data only serves to show that women are portrayed
inaccurately by television sitcoms as was originally claimed in the introduction. Possibly
this trend will change as a result in part of these studies, but as of now, the data is more of
a warning as what to expect in the near future when the 2000’s are included in this
survey.
FINDING 5: Men & Women by Various Activities
The findings in this chart are broken down into various gendered activities which
assumedly would carry gender stereotypes in sitcoms. Smoking, the first portion of the
graph, is decisively male-dominated. Possibly much of this can be attributed to the earlier
section of decades as smoking has lost the popularity it once had; as well, the target
demographic from cigarette companies was apparently male. This factor probably helped
to create the male smoker stereotype in broadcast, though many other factors may have
been involved. The next category, drinking, is a far more even mixture of statistics than
that of smoking. Drinking, of course, never lost the popularity that smoking did. As such,
this statistic shows a much more congruent form than that. As well, it can be assumed
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that the demographic target was not only male from the original advertisers. Overall,
however, males have a slightly higher percentage of drinkers than females. The next two
statistics, betting and punishing, are also typically behaviors that are associated with men.
Not surprisingly, men have higher statistics in both categories. It is reasonable to say that
these statistics represent stereotypical views of men and women in most cases. The last
two statistics are typically female behaviors, nurturing and crying. Interestingly,
nurturing is a somewhat balance between both men and females. While females are still
higher for this statistic, it is a more equal proportion than was to be expected. Potentially
this is because audiences like to see happy endings and caring people in sitcoms, so the
male characters often had to facilitate the role in the absence of appropriate females,
though this cannot be confirmed by the data set at hand. With crying, again, females have
the lead; apparently, females are more emotional than men and cry more often when the
situation arises. What all of these random gendered activities selected mean, however, is
that primetime sitcoms feature stereotypes broadly throughout the different shows. While
some shows probably offset this data slightly, the majority of the statistics represent the
reinforcement of gender roles in media. It should be considered an important part of this
study because it portrays gender in an incorrect way, possibly the point that it is
reinforced in popular culture. Without this data, it would be unclear as to the extent of
which traditional gender roles are strictly adhered to instead of challenged. Despite the
progress seemingly made through the decades, the overall average is still quite poor.
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CONCLUSION
What each of these findings show is very similar in nature: gender and race is
portrayed inaccurately across the board in a variety of different statistics; even the
amount of difference between the subjects of the study accounted for little as stereotypes
were almost universally true in all presented data. Specifically, the African American and
women characters on show fall into the trap of being second and negatively stereotyped
to Caucasians and men, respectively. While more data could have been used to increase
the accuracy of this study, the availability of the data that was available backed up the
initial hypothesis on the state of primetime television sitcoms. This study itself should be
considered an important reflection on the United States’ situation in broadcasting and
serve as an example for the areas that need improvement. Whether or not these studies
have had any influence for media in the 2000’s is ultimately unknown until the
conclusion of the decade, though perhaps they will have a positive impact in the
stereotypes given to African Americans and women, while also increasing the airtime of
minority groups.
Overall, this study should be important on a broader scale as much of media
influences society and vice versa. By continuing to inaccurately represent members of
our society, media is only furthering the message of stereotypes and negative images.
Because of this, the ultimate goal of the study should be not only to reflect upon current
media problems, but problems in our society. Hopefully, this data is an accurate
microcosm of society; possibly this model is enough to increase the knowledge that
change is a necessity in the future of television and society as a whole.