Kicking Ass…With Lip Gloss: Mediating Gender on TLC's PoliceWomen of Broward County

Abstract

This research applies key concepts from feminist work on police programs of the 1970s through to the 1980s, to the reality program Police Women of Broward County. Through a feminist textual analysis of season 1 episodes, this manuscript argues that perpetuation of stereotypical gender norms associated with the “private sphere” allow media corporations to market gender in a new way. Both progressive and oppressive at its core, Police Women of Broward County illustrates a progressive representation of women while simultaneously reinforcing stereotypical gender roles. These stereotypical representations are problematized for the ways in which they re-inscribe less than egalitarian divisions of household labor, encourage acceptance of women's “second shift,” and suggest the "othering" of female law enforcement officers, through special police programming that includes an emphasis on the private sphere.

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