Since the 1960s, feminists have argued that "it matters who makes it." When it comes to the mass media, "who makes it" continues to be men.
In Canada, 28% of newspaper journalists and 37% of televisions journalists are women.
Source: International Federation of Journalists 2001 |
Women working in the media have made some inroads. In 2001, the International Federation of Journalists reported that around the world, 38 per cent of all working journalists are women. Studies conducted by Canadian researchers Gertrude Robinson and Armande Saint-Jean have found that 28 per cent of newspaper editors are female. And according to San Diego State University communications professor Martha Lauzen, 24 per cent of American television producers, writers, and directors are women.
Denis Monière, political analyst and professor at Quebec's University of Montreal maintains that even if the visibility of female journalists has grown in the last ten years, we shouldn't be too quick to shout victory. In 2002, the Canadian Newspaper Association reported that 43 per cent of Canadian newspaper employees are women. However, they account for only eight per cent of editors-in-chief and twelve per cent of publishers. Women employed in the sector tend to work in "pink-collar ghettos"; they make up 70 per cent of the advertising department, and 80 per cent of the accounting and finance staff.
In addition to being un-represented in positions of authority, Monière thinks women are also under-utilized in covering the subjects considered most important—politics, economy and social trends. And when it comes to the evening news, women are almost invisible. The posting of Sophie Thibault in 2002 as the ten o'clock news anchor for the national French-language channel TVA is a "first" for Canada. Most often, women are consigned to noon-hour shows, local newscasts, "fill-ins" and weekend spots.
And Media Action points out that though more than half the journalism graduates in Canada are female, studies have shown that only 30 per cent of newspaper articles are written by women. A study carried out in France in 2000 by the Association of Women Journalists (Association des femmes journalistes—AFJ) pointed out that French television devotes five to nine per cent more news coverage to women than do the other media—clearly the result of more women journalists working in television than in the radio and newspaper industries. The same study showed that women journalists select six per cent more stories on women than men journalists.
However, men continue to occupy approximately 75 per cent of the positions of power in the mass media. And the prospects become much bleaker for women as they climb the corporate ladder.
Lauzen's annual studies of the film industry reveal that women account for only 17 per cent of the creative talent behind the highest grossing Hollywood pictures—16 per cent of executive producers, 11 per cent of producers, and 2 per cent of cinematographers. Robinson and Saint-Jean report that in the newspaper industry, only 5 per cent of managing editors and editors-in-chief are women.
The 2001 study conducted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania is equally damning. The Center reports that only 13 per cent of the top executives of American media, telecommunications and e-companies are female. And that 13 per cent is not concentrated at the top: women constitute only 9 per cent of the boards of directors for these companies, and they hold only 3 per cent of the most powerful positions.
Decision-Making Power Matters
Studies show that a difference can be made when women hold positions of power. In 2000, women editors and journalists took over the newsroom for one day at a newspaper in Wichita Falls, Texas. For the day's top story a choice had to be made between a crime-stopper's story about a peeping tom and an item about local women fighting for equal rights. When the women opted for the latter story, a heated argument erupted. Journalist Laurence Pantin reports that "the women finally won, but only because they held the key positions on that day. All other times, the peeping tom and stories like it would have prevailed."
Two Steps Forward...
Author Kathi Maio reminds us that the march to equality for women in media has had strides forward and setbacks. She writes: "Our story has never been one of steady progress. For example, more women were directing movies in the 1920s (when the industry was new and more open) than in the 1950s. And there were more positive, empowered roles for women in the early '30s than in the early '70s."
The presence of at least one female executive producer on a program doubled the number of female writers. On programs with no female executive producers, female writers accounted for only 13% of all writers.
Source: Martha Lauzen, San Diego State University |
As women continue to struggle for equality in the media, Lauzen's research shows that the biggest difference is made by the women who actually work in the industry. Behind the scenes, they can have a definite impact on the ways women are portrayed on the screen and in print. Lauzen concludes, "When women have more powerful roles in the making of a movie or TV show, we know that we also get more powerful female characters on-screen, women who are more real and more multi-dimensional."
