The media and what is shown on screen has a huge impact on people’s beliefs and behaviors. Because expectations of living, stereotypes, and other norms are depicted through film and television, media promoting gender equality is important, as femininity in the media is often accompanied with gender stereotypes. In the real world, women struggle regularly with objectification and inequalities such as the wage gap. Gender equality in the media could potentially be attained if there were more women on screen. However, the quality of representation in regards to racial diversity, portraying women in positions of power, and women covering a wider range of news categories in broadcasting is more significant than the quantity.
Women have less speaking roles in films. According to a study conducted by the USC Annenberg School of Journalism, women only received 31.4% of the speaking roles in movies in 2016, and the ratio of males to females in these films was 2.3 : 1. In addition to this, the top 100 films in 2016 did not represent women from minority groups. Of the top rated 100 films in 2016, 47 had no African American females, 66 had no Asian American females and 72 had no Hispanic females (Smith). Along with this, a study conducted by the Center For the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University says 74% of all female characters were White, 11% were Black, 4% were Latina, 4% were Asian. The underrepresentation of
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women in film and television is also accompanied with the underrepresentation of minority groups in the United States.
A fourth of the already insufficient film representation women get consists of objectification, 25.4% of women were portrayed in sexualized attire (USC Annenberg). The sexualisation of women onscreen should be controlled before simply adding speaking roles to balance out statistics of male to female roles in film.
53.5% of women were portrayed as caregivers vs 41.9% of men, portraying women in a more domesticated role than men (USC Annenberg). This, accompanied with The Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film which that says that women are more likely to be portrayed without an active career onscreen (61% of males vs 34% of women). Women are mostly portrayed in a stay at home position rather than with an active job or career. This inaccurately represents women in the real world, because far less women are being represented working in the media than in real life, according to the U.S. Department of Labor blog, 56.8% of women are in the workforce.
Gender roles are also prominent in Disney Movies. According to an honors thesis at Indiana State University, Disney Princesses are often portrayed as the “damsel in distress”, reinforcing gender roles to a young audience. In Snow White, there is a song, “Someday My Prince Will Come”, which reflects a woman waiting on a man. In Beauty and the Beast, the first musical number “Belle” depicts men and women in stereotypical roles amongst the town. Women in the village were mostly consumers, found buying goods and taking care of children, while all the business owners were male. This implies that the primary financial providers were
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male. In the Little Mermaid, Ariel submissively gives up her voice in order to be on land with the prince, which demonstrates the power of men over female actions. Although the women in these movies were the main character, and for some the title role, the quality of their representation was questionable due to the gender roles present. The quality is more significant than the quantity, because their targeted audience is children.
There are parameters that have arisen to analyze the representation of women in the media. For example, the Bechdel Test, or the Mo Movie measure, is designed to examine the representation of women in films. The test can be passed if there is a conversation between two women who speak to each other about a topic other than men (Bechdel). The Bechdel Test does not just focus on how many women are in media, but analyzes the depth of their characters stories. Just because a show is comprised of women and women driven does not mean it follows the Bechdel rule. An NPR podcast gave the example of Sex and the City, a TV show with 4 female lead characters, that at the time could not pass the Bechdel Test due to how much the women on the show talked about men. The Bechdel Test examines the quality of female characters onscreen. According to Eric Diggens, a media analyst on the NPR podcast gender representation should not be based on meeting quotas, but about the audience being able to identify with the characters they see onscreen.
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This graph, from the USC study projects closing the gap between the male and female speaking roles. If 5 female speaking roles per script were added to the 900 films studied, the gap of between male and female speaking roles would decrease from 37.2% in 2016 to 3.4% in 2019. However, in order for those 5 speaking roles to significantly contribute to help gender media equality, the quality of those 5 roles should be considered.
According to a study conducted by the Women’s Media Center, men dominate US media receiving 62% of the credits in print, internet, TV, and news, while women only receive 38%. A majority of reported news is dominated by men, however women have the upper hand over some news topics. For example, according to this visual, women produce more health, education, and lifestyle news than men do.
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More women reporting on sports, weather, and crime and justice, will help women be better represented in news, rather than just being restricted in covering topics such as lifestyle, and education. A study conducted by Purdue University sociologists says that, 96% of all sports
news cover men’s sports, leaving only 4% for women. However, The National Federation of High School sports says that 3.7 million girls play sports, compared to 4.4 million boys. Generous coverage of men’s sports leaves little to no time for women’s sports, which is because only 11% of sports reporters are female. More female sports reporters will lead to better representation of women in broadcasting, as well as help increase the coverage of women’s sports in the news.
Increasing the number of women on screen does not necessarily ensure gender equality in the media. Alongside focusing on balancing out the number of females to males, the quality of
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representation should be taken into consideration as well. One way to achieve this is to include more women of color in films, as well as to portray them in positions of power. Portraying women in positions of power, more diversity, and women covering more topics in news media will be more effective in attaining media equality than simply adding roles in news and in film.