We’ve come a long way, baby

Posted on August 4, 2007 by Melissa Worden

This circa 1950 film, “Your Life Work Series: Journalism,” reminds us that we have come along way not just in what we do, but who does it. The narrator in the video states:

“Women find it difficult to compete with men in general reporting jobs. So girls who want to be successful in journalism should prepare for work in the special women’s departments.

“Home decoration, childcare, gardening, and household hints are found in the homemaking section, a department handled by women.

“Also included are cookery, meal-planning suggestions, menus, recipes and attractive ways of arranging the table. Work in fashion, beauty care and merchandise reporting, affords further opportunities, almost exclusively for women.”

Opportunities for women seem much better nowadays, but a 2006 census by the ASNE shows that the number of women in the industry is up only slightly.

“Women outnumber men in entry-level jobs. But when it comes to the prestige beats, the assigning editor ranks, the department heads and upper management, the scales tip back toward the men,” says Pam Moreland, assistant managing editor of the San Jose Mercury News and former president of the Journalism and Women Symposium.

“The larger the newspaper, the likelihood is that you will find male publishers, male executive editors, possibly a woman managing editor, two or three women in the deputy or assistant managing editor ranks, and two or three women department heads. Progress when compared to 30 years ago? You bet. Progress when compared to five years ago? A bit.”

But one place where we seem to be coming full circle: 1950’s “country publisher” is becoming today’s “backpack journalist.” The film’s narrator says:

“In fact he has to know and be able to do a great many things which can be learned only through actual experience … all this knowledge and experience seems a great deal to ask of one man, but he leads a happy life.”

Sound familiar?