"Women have yet to enter to Bahrain’s parliament despite being permitted to run for some years. With its king promoting social and economic change, the media has portrayed positive images of Arab women as professionals against a backdrop of religious conservatism. The communications strategy adopt
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ed by some women candidates to attain election to parliament and the response of the local media are analysed utilizing content analysis. Despite some variation of coverage, the media in this Persian Gulf country were found to be fair to all women candidates and generally gender-neutral. Although the women candidates who applied a well thought-out communications strategy did better in media coverage and voting results, ultimately none were elected. This article explores the reasons for this failure in terms of Islamist religious interpretations of the role of women and Arab cultural conventions regarding family life. Finally, the authors speculate briefly about the prospects of political communications by women challenging Arab cultural conservatism in the future." (Abstract)
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"This book moves beyond sensationalism to consider how the evangelical movement has effectively targeted Americans—as both converts and consumers—since the 1970s. Thousands of products promoting the Christian faith are sold to millions of consumers each year through the Web, mail order catalogs,
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and even national chains such as Kmart and Wal-Mart. The author explores the vast industries of film, video, magazines, and kitsch that evangelicals use to spread their message. Focusing on the center of conservative evangelical culture—the white, middle-class Americans who can afford to buy “Christian lifestyle” products—she examines the industrial history of evangelist media, the curious subtleties of the products themselves, and their success in the religious and secular marketplace. To garner a wider audience, evangelicals have had to carefully temper their message, but in so doing, they have painted themselves into a corner. In the postwar years, evangelical media wore the message of salvation on its sleeve, but as the evangelical media industry has grown, many of its most popular products have been those with heavily diluted Christian messages." (Publisher description)
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