Watching Women’s Liberation, 1970: Feminism’s Pivotal Year on the Network News by Bonnie J. Dow (review)

In Watching Women’s Liberation, 1970: Feminism’s Pivotal Year on the Network News, Bonnie J. Dow provides yet another excellent contribution to the field of feminist media history. Although several chapters are based on previously published work, this book brings them together in a coherent, well-written, well-researched and extremely compelling monograph that will be of interest to undergraduates, graduates, and anyone wishing to find out more about network coverage of women’s liberation in the US.

Chapter one begins back in 1968 with the infamous Miss America beauty pageant protest in Atlantic City — an event that the network news ignored at the time, but the protest’s visibility Dow notes was a “constant reference point for coverage in 1970” (p. 29). Dow expertly traces the history of the protest, paying particular attention to the creation of one of the most endearing myths about feminism: the feminist bra-burner. Dow rightly addresses the impact of this myth, namely that it portrayed feminists as fighting for “frivolous” goals (p. 31). She also pays attention to the general whitewashing of coverage that contributed to the myth that the movement excluded and was ignorant of problems faced by women of colour. The chapter concludes with Dow’s assessment that early press coverage of this protest paved the way for an interpretive framework used throughout the decade, stipulating that feminists were intent on rejecting femininity and instead acquiring masculinity, and in the process effeminising men.

Chapter two focuses on network coverage of the movement in the spring of 1970 on two of the three major networks — cbs and nbc. In total, these networks produced nine studies, totalling around 53 minutes, and are important because they represented the “the most sustained attention the movement would receive in 1970” (p. 91). Although the third major network, abc, also devoted air-time to the movement, this was evident in a documentary aired in May, which is the focus of chapter four. In her assessment of cbs and nbc, Dow concludes the former was not complimentary, while the latter’s coverage was more positive. Whereas cbs paid particular attention to feminists’ behaviour rather than their issues, the opposite was often true of nbc. cbs also treated the movement with “bemused scepticism” (p. 57), indicating they were targeting a mostly male audience, but nbc’s coverage presumed viewers to be women, and provided them with concrete information about sexism and potential solutions (such as how to file a complaint to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission).

Chapter three assesses media coverage of the well-known Ladies Home Journal protest on 18 March, when roughly 200 women from various feminist coalitions occupied the magazine’s office for approximately eleven hours, launching a wide range of critiques including the need for a female editor-in-chief, more women on the editorial staff, sexism apparent in various advertisements, and other employment practices. According to Dow, the protest was particularly important as a feminist media event that had “powerful immediate and long-term consequences” (p. 96). Dow’s account includes inside information about its origins, its organizers, and fractures within the movement that emerged as a result.

In Chapter four, Dow analyzes the rhetorical devices used in abc’s documentary Women’s Liberation, spearheaded by feminist journalist Marlene Sanders to “correct misconceptions about the movement and to improve its public image” (p. 121). Although Sanders created the documentary to aide feminism, Dow notes the ways she intentionally narrowed the movement’s meaning to exclude lesbians, women of colour, and more radical feminists. Dow argues that the documentary drew upon various rhetorical struggles to align the movement within a decidedly liberal frame, which drew heavily upon the sex-race analogy to secure public support.

The fifth chapter details coverage of the Women’s Strike for Equality, held in New York City on...