A Matter of Time: An Exploration of Gender in Time Magazine Covers Since 1965

Gender is a concept that influences almost all cultures as we know them. Current literature on this topic argues that gender is not an innate characteristic of society, but rather it is socially constructed and maintained by family, peers, and institutions. The main goal of this study is to illuminate the ways in which the news media maintains the dichotomous gender system by portraying men and women in gender-stereotypical roles. This study contributes to existing literature about gender in the media as it pertains to news media, rather than advertising or media targeted at one gender such as women’s or men’s magazines. A content and textual analysis was done on U.S. TIME Magazine covers from 1965-2014 that examined adult human figures in relation to body display, theme, gender, facial presence, and clothing type. Results indicated that gender had a significant relationship with all other variables, supporting hypotheses about gender-stereotypical roles