Re-presenting women executives: valorization and devalorization in US business press

摘要

Perceived compatibility between requirements of managerial workand attributes of women is believed important to the advancement andsuccess of women, and research demonstrates continued ambivalenceabout women executives. The question of how images of womenexecutives are disseminated, reproducing or contesting negativecharacterizations, has received little attention. The researchreported here focuses on US business press as a cultural carrierdisseminating images of women executives. Critical discourse analysisexamined 27 front page Wall Street Journal accounts of 22 womenexecutives in the year following Carly Fiorina's appointment to headHewlett-Packard; 20 front page accounts of 24 men executives wereused as comparison.