Abstract

This thesis analyzes the content of United States Congresswomen's Tweets during the 2017 and 2018 Women's March on Washington (WMW). The research is based on the media framing theory. Previous literature has asserted that women in Congress place a higher priority on women's issues than other policy legislations. This study sought to determine the degree to which these assertions were true by analyzing Congresswomen's tweets during the WMW. A total of 1950 tweets from Congresswomen were collected during four days and analyzed for content and tone. Findings in this thesis invalidate that claim as the results of the investigation shows that less than twenty percent (18.8%) of the tweets posted by Democratic Congresswomen were related to the WMW and only 1% by their Republican counterparts. The rest of the tweets dealt with other issues such as their party's agenda, the opposition agenda, and issues unrelated to politics. Overall, the study found that similar to their male counterparts, United States Congresswomen place a higher priority on their legislative duties. The number of Congresswomen's tweets during that period were higher in other categories than the WMW category. Party's affiliation was found to be a factor as higher percentage of Democratic Congresswomen tweeted about the WMW than their Republican counterparts. The author concludes that Congresswomen's rhetoric is not centered primarily on women's issues as noted by prior literature. Future research is suggested to investigate data contained in Congresswomen's retweets and replies, and women's rights bills passed by Congresswomen during legislative sessions.

Notes

If this is your thesis or dissertation, and want to learn how to access it or for more information about readership statistics, contact us at STARS@ucf.edu

Graduation Date

2018

Semester

Spring

Advisor

Malala, John

Degree

Master of Arts (M.A.)

College

College of Sciences

Department

Communication

Degree Program

Communication; Interpersonal Communication

Format

application/pdf

Identifier

CFE0007064

URL

http://purl.fcla.edu/fcla/etd/CFE0007064

Language

English

Release Date

May 2018

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Open Access)

Share

COinS