Television comedy reflects the social setting in which the show is produced, for writers, producers, and directors know that images reflecting the lives of the viewers have the power to evoke laughter more than images that are completely alien to the life experiences of the viewers. Comic styles on television have changed along with the times. This does not necessarily mean that the comedy is dated as some charge--I Love Lucy is no less funny now than it was in 1955, for example--but viewers look at these episodes with somewhat different eyes just the same. Consider just one element and how it has changed over the years, that element being the way women are depicted on television comedies. Lucy in I Love Lucy may be the star of the show, but in the context of 1950s society, she is subordinate to her husband, and indeed, much of the comedy derives from how she challenges that role by wanting to be what he is--someone in show business, someone known and recognized, someone with a role outside the home. More than a decade later, Mary in The Mary Tyler Moore Show would have a role outside the home but would still be secondary to the males in the workplace. Another fifteen years would bring Murphy in Murphy Brown to the screen, and by now the changes being wrought by the women's movement would greatly alter how this woman would be portrayed--she was now a major power in her own right, though with hints that she is seen as excessively shrill and too ambitious for a woman even today. The subject matter of comedy thus adapted to changing roles for women and continues to do so.
However, the role of women on television remains secondary to men for the most part. The Report of the United States Commission on Civil Rights in 1977 found that minorities and women were underrepresented on television: "When they do appear they are frequently seen in token or stereotyped roles" (Commission on Civil Rights 3). A National Organization for...