Disciplinary intersections of gender and ethnicity in populist radical right media in Romania

The present study examines how the desirable ideals of femininity for the ethno-nationalist project are framed in populist radical right media in contemporary Romania. The study examines the editorials of populist radical right party leader (Corneliu Vadim Tudor) published at election times between 2000 and 2012 in the weekly party publication. It explores the inventory of media frames, which provide the panopticon of femininity performances coming forth in Tudor’s editorials, and the disciplining endeavours these depictions enable. In the first step, the femininity performance of Romanian women seen as nationalist ideal of submission and childbearing is juxtaposed with the portrayal of women who forsake such expectations, and that of Roma women described as promiscuous and overly fertile. In the second step, the roles afforded to women in the public arena are evidenced, either as selfless heroines or their antithetic depiction, the power-hungry women.