Battling old ghosts in gender and African media research

Abstract

There has been more attention paid to the nexus between gender and media in Af- rica since re-democratization spurred the growth of pluralistic media on the Continent. Increasingly also gender and media research in Africa is being enriched by synergies between those in academia and civil society, resulting in better knowledge on media representation, participation, audience reception as well as uncovering hidden his- tories of women’s contributions to the media, and on occasion, the political economy of media industries. This review article provides a discussion on some of the recent trends in scholarship in the field of gender and media in Africa, and argues that despite the growing body of research on the subject there remain gaps in scholarship that need to be addressed. The article advocates a research agenda that is creative, dynamic and responsive to the developmental needs of Africa, and especially atten- tive to the links between media and gendered social justice. It also demands more research which is demographically differentiated to enable better insights on, for example, the influence of media on rural versus urban, or young versus old gendered audiences. The review article argues that since gender studies go beyond just women studies, gender and media researchers must expand their research focus to embrace masculinities and develop empirical and theoretical understandings of the gendering of men in African media also.