Influence of TV News Talk Shows on Female Student’s Participation in Politics: A Case of Rongo University, Kenya

Abstract

TV News Talk Shows are powerful media programs that can frame the way people perceive and think of society. The content of these talk shows creates, perpetuates narratives and influences how we consider men's and women's roles in public and private sectors. Women continue to lag in Kenyan political participation despite being the larger group in the country. The study focused on how the content of Kenyan news talk shows that is: JKL, Punchline and Crossfire influence female university students’ participation in politics. The study was guided by the following objectives: to establish how the language used in news talk shows influences female students’ participation in politics, and to determine how news talk shows topic of discussion influences female students’ participation in politics. The research aimed at working towards the achievement of SDG 5 gender equality. A descriptive Correctional research design was employed. A semi-structured questionnaire and one on one interview data collection technique were used to collect data from 356 female university students at Rongo University and six producers of TV news talk shows. The researcher employed snowballing and simple random techniques to sample the respondents respectively. Sample size was arrived at using Yamane formulae. Data collected was qualitatively analyzed through content analysis. Data was presented on graphs, pie charts and tables. The study found that language used on TV news talk shows discourages the majority of female students from participatingin politics. The topic of discussion selected by producers when female politicians are invited was established to be irrelevant to their political journey. The study recommends media houses to offer training for journalists on gender reporting that’ll ensure gender-balanced coverage of news talk shows. The government needs to put more effort into ensuring that it achieves gender equality by appointing women to political seats and encouraging their participation in politics.