WAITING FOR PRIME TIME: The Women of Televison News

by Marlene & Marcia Rock Sanders ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 30, 1988

A rather two-headed history of newswomen, straining to be both an autobiography of one woman's career and a comprehensive account of women in TV news. Two distinct voices are at cross purposes here: Sanders (veteran correspondent, anchor, producer, and network V.P.) tells her own story in deadening detail, complete with long-nurtured gripes, while Rock (journalism professor and Emmy-winning producer) fleshes out the historical picture with accounts of other female pioneers in the TV news industry. Paragraph by paragraph, it is altogether too obvious where one voice ends and the other takes up, making for choppy reading as the prose shifts back and forth between first-person and third. Despite her rÉsumÉ, Sanders offers little insight into events she covered (both Kennedy assassinations, the Vietnam war, the 1968 Democratic convention and countless political campaigns). And Rock's broader historical perspective is curiously absent much of the time. Apart from banal observations--labeling Vietnam the first TV war, for example--nothing substantial is said. Worth reading, though, is a chapter on the influx of women into TV news during the 1970's, a migration resulting in heightened coverage of the women's movement and a spate of sex-discrimination suits against the networks. Not surprisingly, Sanders' subjective voice is muted here. Although studded with comments from top newsmen and women, this commendable enterprise yields neither a particularly illuminating history of TV news nor a fresh commentary on the role of women within it.

Pub Date: Sept. 30, 1988

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Univ. of Illinois Press

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1988

Categories: NONFICTION