Making Change. Nordic Examples of Working Towards Gender Equality in the Media

 

How can the media industry promote gender equality? What difference can activists make? How can research contribute to developing and sharing knowledge? These issues were in focus of the project Nordic Gender & Media Forum. 

@nordicom. Image cover by Carina Kågström

I was the proud project leader of the Forum and the co-editor of the Nordicom anthology Making change. Nordic Examples of Working Towards Gender Equality in the Media. The project can be seen as a Nordic follow up on Section J  in the Beijing Platform for Action.
In the anthology Making change (available online, open access) researchers, activists and industry representatives share good practices from the Nordic countries. The anthology also contains gender based statistics about film, journalism, computer games and advertising compiled by Nordicom.

When collecting the Nordic media statistics it became clear that comparative studies like the ones from IMWF, EIGE and GMMP are crucial for creating knowledge that can make gender equality in the media to move forward.
Nordicom launched the book in Vilnius in December 2014, in cooperation with the Nordic Council of Minister 's Information Office in Lithuania and EIGE.
It was also launched in New York in 2015 connection with the CSW59.  (The project was financed by the Nordic Council of Ministers.)

Read my expert comments ...

When EIGE, the European Institute for Gender Equality, worked on their report   Advancing gender equality in decision-making in media organisations they asked me about why it is important to get women involved in media-related education and careers, why there are still so few many women in the news and what can be done about it.
This is what I answered:
What about gender in the media? Interviews with women experts.

The report, fact sheets and the interview  as well as the other Beijing follow up report can be found here.

Time to Step Up

On the global debate about gender equality in the media there is often a demand for regional discussions. I am privileged to be part of such a project, Nordic Gender & Media Forum, organized by Nordicom at the University of Gothenburg.

During 2014 there will be a number of activities where of course the work of IWMF will be an important part of the discussion.

Panel at the ICA Conference in London

We are very fortunate. In June, some of the contributors to the Palgrave International Handbook on Women and Journalism ( see earlier blogpost) will be able analyze the current situation for female journalists. Thanks to our editor, Carolyn M Byerly, we will be part of the academic discussion in London where The 63rd Annual Conference of International Communication Association (ICA) will be held. Only 36 % of the papers and panels were accepted so it is quite a thrill. For me it is also my first ICA conference.

The theme of our panel is Women Journalists in Turbulent Times: The gendered impact of historical shifts in newsrooms. The panelist are: Carolyn M Byerly, Howard University, Jad Melki, American University of Beirut, Diana Iulia Nastasia, Southern Illinois University, Margaretha Geertsema-Sligh, Butler University and my self, Maria Edstrom, University of Gothenburg.

If you are attending the ICA conference, please come and take part of the seminar:
Scheduled Time: Thu, Jun 20 - 9:30am - 10:45am  
Building/Room: Hilton Metropole, Hilton Meeting Rooms 16 & 17, London

From the abstract:
Women journalists are caught in a confluence of local world events that is not of their making but which shapes their work lives nonetheless. This panel identifies some of these events – what we characterize as “historical shifts”—and explores how these shifts are affecting women’s occupational status and ability to do their work as reporters. Indeed, the overarching goal is to find the otherwise invisible gendered dimensions of forces that affect and/or reshape women journalists’ relationship to the profession and their work. These forces are produced in the macro-sphere by political shifts like popular uprisings that topple governments, economic shifts that are producing unemployment or stagnation (including in newsrooms), technological shifts that are changing the nature of news making, and cultural shifts like the rise of religious fundamentalism, particularly in the Arab states. 

Some of these impacts have been documented in recent research, in which some panelists have participated. Relevant examples include the Global Report on the Status of Women in News Media, which surveyed women’s location in more than 500 news companies around the world, and the Global Media Monitoring Report, which examined (among other things) the extent to which women reporters cover serious news like politics, war, and the economy. 

The full abstract can be found here.