Selling Sex to Radio Program Directors: A Content Analysis of Radio & Records Magazine

Abstract

This study was designed to examine whether radio format and musical artists' gender predict sexual content in trade advertisements geared toward radio program directors. Advertisements were coded from one of the leading music trade magazines, Radio & Records magazine, between 2002 and 2003. Results indicated that overall women artists used sexual content in trade advertisements more often and to a greater degree than did men. In some cases, advertisements in radio formats with younger demographic markets, such as pop or hip-hop, also used higher levels of sexual content. It is concluded that the organizational context of the commercial music industry helps to perpetuate status differences between women and men artists, which may then bring about a cognitive bias in the field that promotes women artists' over reliance on using sexual content in trade advertisements.

Who said hip-hop was dead? The politics of hip-hop culture in Immortal Technique’s lyrics

“…This article shows that Immortal Technique expresses resistance to ruling-class control over the mass media in general and hip-hop in particular. These findings run counter to Adorno and Horkheimer's (1944) argument that mass culture is doomed to reproduce capitalist ideology, as well as prior literature depicting hip-hop culture as co-opted by large corporations (Johnson, 2008;Myer and Kleck, 2007;Tanner-Smith et al, 2006). Rather, it demonstrates that artists such as Immortal Technique can be organic intellectuals who aid in forming critical social consciousness.…”

Introduction

“…They find five gender-related themes: (1) naming/shaming, or songs aimed at degrading women, (2) sexual objectification, or the notion that women are only good for sex, (3) distrust of women, or the suspicion of women who are prone to betray men, (4) legitimating violence, or violent punishment toward women, and (5) prostitution and pimping, or women as subordinates to men who are pimps. Similarly, Tanner- Smith et al (2006) analyze the content of Radio and Records magazine to determine that women in hip-hop are portrayed as vulnerable, domestic, and subordinate sex objects. Within hip-hop videos from 2007 to 2008, Hunter (2011) finds that performers merge ideals of a successful rap mogul with strip club culture to create a gendered relationship based on sexual transaction.…”

“…On one hand, the culture exploits black women's sexuality, denigrates black womanhood, and endangers the lives of young black girls (Pough 2004). On the other hand, it has opened a space for women to determine for themselves the image they want to portray (Balaji 2010;Collins 2005;Emerson 2002), and even use that space to create economic opportunities in the marketplace that challenge hegemony by industry elites and take back their sexuality (Miller-Young 2008;Stapleton 1998;Tanner-Smith et al 2006). Most notably, an analysis of Brooklyn based female rapper Jean Grae elucidates the ways in which her music interrupts notions of black heteronormative sexuality (Smalls 2011).…”

Aproximación a las representaciones mediáticas de la mujer

“…Más cerca del panorama de la radio de entretenimiento, se realizó un análisis de contenido de 865 comerciales de las revistas 'Radio and Records' y 'Billboard' (enero de 2002 a diciembre de 2003). Ambas revistas buscan influenciar la audiencia tanto de la radio como de la industria disquera y sus principales consumidores son directores de programas de radio, quienes figuran como una especie de 'vigilantes' o 'porteros' de la industria musical (Tanner, et al, 2006). La primera conclusión de este estudio es que las mujeres mostradas en los comerciales de las revistas son más sensuales y provocativas que los artistas hombres.…”