Ita Buttrose, Dulcie Boling, and Nene King

The Construction of 'Idealised Feminine Leadership' in the Australian Media, 1972-1999

Bibliographic Data

ID5854283
AuthorsLars Samuelsson (0000-0002-6756-8448)
Year2024
Pages1-18
Publication date2024-02-26
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueAustralian Feminist Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1321-7568 • E-ISSN: 1465-3303
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/08164649.2024.2321579
OpenAlexW4392194459
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited25

Ita Buttrose, Dulcie Boling, and Nene King were three of the most influential women leaders in the Australian media from the 1970s through to the turn of the twenty-first century. They were all editors of some of Australia’s most popular women’s magazines, including Cleo, Woman’s Day, New Idea and the Australian Women’s Weekly, and were all appointed to positions on the boards of Australia’s top media companies. This article historicises the careers of Buttrose, Boling, and King, positing that the way that their careers were constructed in the media, by themselves and others, reinforced gendered assumptions regarding women’s leadership capabilities. These constructions evidence a nascent postfeminist conception of women in power in Australia from the 1970s through to the 1990s. The article suggests that the ability (or not) of Buttrose, Boling, and King to conform to idealised ‘feminine’ leadership ideals reinforced (rather than challenged) the highly gendered nature of Australian corporate media leadership and governance

Sociology · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Media Studies and Communication · Social Media and Politics · Gender Studies

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