6:11 pm - 09/21/2012
If you’re a female professional in Denver, one event almost makes you forget that women are CEOs at only 4 percent of Fortune 1000 companies: The Women’s Foundation of Colorado annual luncheon.
This year, the Women’s Foundation marked its 25th anniversary by inviting more than 2,000 of its supporters — mostly women — to a fundraising lunch Friday at the Colorado Convention Center.
The guest of honor was none other than Academy Award-winning actress Geena Davis, who has made it one of her life goals to reduce gender stereotyping in film and television.
She founded the nonprofit Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, which works with film and TV producers to increase the percentages of female characters and reduce stereotyping in media for children 11 and under.
Davis made her points with humor, interspersing jokes and funny anecdotes with sobering statistics about girls and women in society to drive home the point that “gender inequalities are deeply entrenched” in our society.
She told the appreciative crowd that she has been selective about roles in her career because she is so concerned about gender stereotyping.
“True, I was in a movie called, ‘Earth Girls are Easy,’” Davis joked, “but that was early on.”
She said she prefers to be called an “actor” and looks forward to the day when the “ess” is removed from the description of female actors.
The movie that really cemented her drive to ensure the accurate portrayal of girls and women in the media was the 1991 classic, “Thelma & Louise.”
“Thelma & Louise effectively changed the course of my life,” Davis said. “It has driven my commitment to empower women.”
Before that movie, Davis said people would come up to her and say things like, “Oh, I loved you in Beetlejuice.” Or, “I really liked your role in The Fly.”
That was during my bug phase,” she joked.
But after Thelma & Louise, women came up to her and told her “about the impact the movie had made in their lives. How it made them feel empowered. That brought home to me in a big way how few opportunities we [as women] have to feel strongly about characters like this in movies.”
She said 17 percent seems to be a common percentage when it comes to women, from representation in government and corporate boardrooms, to the percentage of women in crowd scenes in movies.
“I thought, maybe only 17 percent of the people in crowd scenes are women because women don’t like to gather,” Davis said, with a sly smile.
She said the ratio of male to female characters in films, at around 4-to-1 or 5-to-1, has remained the same since 1946, and she, personally, didn’t grow up with female characters that she wanted to emulate.
“We had, ‘I Dream of Jeannie,’ and ‘Bewitched,’” she said, noting that the bulk of those shows was spent on the men trying to stop the women from using their magical powers.
“This happened in several of my marriages,” Davis said wryly.
Davis has taken a special interest in gender representation in media for young children, and she formed her nonprofit to produce statistics to back up her own perceptions of girls and women in the media.
What our culture is saying with the lack of strong female leads and hypersexualization of female characters in shows for children is “that girls and women are less valuable than boys and men. We’re training yet another generation not to notice gender imbalance,” she said.
We caught up with Davis and asked her a few questions via e-mail.
Q: What has been your favorite movie character to portray? Dottie in "A League of Their Own"? Thelma in "Thelma & Louise?"
A: Those are definitely two of my absolute favorites. But I also really liked Charly Baltimore in "Long Kiss Goodnight." And playing the first woman president on TV ("Commander in Chief," 2005-2006) was pretty thrilling, I must say!
Q: Your Institute on Gender in Media focuses on children 11 and younger. Why that age?
A: What I didn't know, until I had a daughter, was how poorly we're doing by girls in kids' entertainment! I decided I wanted to help the creators of kids media to realize how few female characters they were putting into what's made specifically for kids, and how stereotyped those few females characters were — especially in family films. I formed the Institute so I could have the data to back up my perception, and we now have sponsored the largest amount of research ever done on gender representations in media. We've chosen to focus on kids 11 and under because if boys and girls grow up seeing a big imbalance in the ratio of male to female characters from the very beginning, they will start to see this imbalance as normal. They may grow up believing that girls aren't as important as boys.
Q: Can you point to some of the positive media role models out there right now for that age group, in television and/or recent movies?
A: We make it a practice not to point out specific shows or movies, for good or ill. My philosophy is that it's usually fine, for example, to take your kids to the latest animated film that's showing — but point out gender imbalance if you see it, and discuss stereotyping and hyper-sexualization of the female characters with them.
Q: What was your personal experience growing up: Were there more positive or negative gender portrayals? Do you think it has gotten better or worse?
A: The research shows that things have stayed pretty much exactly the same: The ratio of male to female characters has been the same since 1946! There's something very comfortable or familiar to creators about a 3-, 4- or 5-to-1 ratio. I know as a kid there weren't really any women TV characters I wanted to emulate; my best friend and I used to pretend to be the (male) characters on "The Rifleman!"
Q: Archery has become a popular sport — is it something you continue to practice? How do you feel about the image portrayed by archery wiz Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) in "The Hunger Games?"
A: I haven't competed in archery for a while now — with the kids still young and my crazy schedule it's hard to fit in hours of practice. I loved the archery in "Hunger Games," and in "Brave" as well; both were so well done. The lucky thing for me is that archery is not an age-dependent sport, so I can take it up again anytime.
SOURCE 1
SOURCE 2
Ah! She's a Brave and Hunger Games fan lol! Flawless Queen speaking the truth. They really do need to fix the way women are portrayed in the media. Shows like 'Two Broke Girls' and 'Whitney' aren't helping imo. And yes, I'm sorry to say, neither is Real Housewives (I'm sorry!)
Geena Davis: "Gender inequalities are deeply entrenched"
If you’re a female professional in Denver, one event almost makes you forget that women are CEOs at only 4 percent of Fortune 1000 companies: The Women’s Foundation of Colorado annual luncheon.
This year, the Women’s Foundation marked its 25th anniversary by inviting more than 2,000 of its supporters — mostly women — to a fundraising lunch Friday at the Colorado Convention Center.
The guest of honor was none other than Academy Award-winning actress Geena Davis, who has made it one of her life goals to reduce gender stereotyping in film and television.
She founded the nonprofit Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, which works with film and TV producers to increase the percentages of female characters and reduce stereotyping in media for children 11 and under.
Davis made her points with humor, interspersing jokes and funny anecdotes with sobering statistics about girls and women in society to drive home the point that “gender inequalities are deeply entrenched” in our society.
She told the appreciative crowd that she has been selective about roles in her career because she is so concerned about gender stereotyping.
“True, I was in a movie called, ‘Earth Girls are Easy,’” Davis joked, “but that was early on.”
She said she prefers to be called an “actor” and looks forward to the day when the “ess” is removed from the description of female actors.
The movie that really cemented her drive to ensure the accurate portrayal of girls and women in the media was the 1991 classic, “Thelma & Louise.”
“Thelma & Louise effectively changed the course of my life,” Davis said. “It has driven my commitment to empower women.”
Before that movie, Davis said people would come up to her and say things like, “Oh, I loved you in Beetlejuice.” Or, “I really liked your role in The Fly.”
That was during my bug phase,” she joked.
But after Thelma & Louise, women came up to her and told her “about the impact the movie had made in their lives. How it made them feel empowered. That brought home to me in a big way how few opportunities we [as women] have to feel strongly about characters like this in movies.”
She said 17 percent seems to be a common percentage when it comes to women, from representation in government and corporate boardrooms, to the percentage of women in crowd scenes in movies.
“I thought, maybe only 17 percent of the people in crowd scenes are women because women don’t like to gather,” Davis said, with a sly smile.
She said the ratio of male to female characters in films, at around 4-to-1 or 5-to-1, has remained the same since 1946, and she, personally, didn’t grow up with female characters that she wanted to emulate.
“We had, ‘I Dream of Jeannie,’ and ‘Bewitched,’” she said, noting that the bulk of those shows was spent on the men trying to stop the women from using their magical powers.
“This happened in several of my marriages,” Davis said wryly.
Davis has taken a special interest in gender representation in media for young children, and she formed her nonprofit to produce statistics to back up her own perceptions of girls and women in the media.
What our culture is saying with the lack of strong female leads and hypersexualization of female characters in shows for children is “that girls and women are less valuable than boys and men. We’re training yet another generation not to notice gender imbalance,” she said.
We caught up with Davis and asked her a few questions via e-mail.
Q: What has been your favorite movie character to portray? Dottie in "A League of Their Own"? Thelma in "Thelma & Louise?"
A: Those are definitely two of my absolute favorites. But I also really liked Charly Baltimore in "Long Kiss Goodnight." And playing the first woman president on TV ("Commander in Chief," 2005-2006) was pretty thrilling, I must say!
Q: Your Institute on Gender in Media focuses on children 11 and younger. Why that age?
A: What I didn't know, until I had a daughter, was how poorly we're doing by girls in kids' entertainment! I decided I wanted to help the creators of kids media to realize how few female characters they were putting into what's made specifically for kids, and how stereotyped those few females characters were — especially in family films. I formed the Institute so I could have the data to back up my perception, and we now have sponsored the largest amount of research ever done on gender representations in media. We've chosen to focus on kids 11 and under because if boys and girls grow up seeing a big imbalance in the ratio of male to female characters from the very beginning, they will start to see this imbalance as normal. They may grow up believing that girls aren't as important as boys.
Q: Can you point to some of the positive media role models out there right now for that age group, in television and/or recent movies?
A: We make it a practice not to point out specific shows or movies, for good or ill. My philosophy is that it's usually fine, for example, to take your kids to the latest animated film that's showing — but point out gender imbalance if you see it, and discuss stereotyping and hyper-sexualization of the female characters with them.
Q: What was your personal experience growing up: Were there more positive or negative gender portrayals? Do you think it has gotten better or worse?
A: The research shows that things have stayed pretty much exactly the same: The ratio of male to female characters has been the same since 1946! There's something very comfortable or familiar to creators about a 3-, 4- or 5-to-1 ratio. I know as a kid there weren't really any women TV characters I wanted to emulate; my best friend and I used to pretend to be the (male) characters on "The Rifleman!"
Q: Archery has become a popular sport — is it something you continue to practice? How do you feel about the image portrayed by archery wiz Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) in "The Hunger Games?"
A: I haven't competed in archery for a while now — with the kids still young and my crazy schedule it's hard to fit in hours of practice. I loved the archery in "Hunger Games," and in "Brave" as well; both were so well done. The lucky thing for me is that archery is not an age-dependent sport, so I can take it up again anytime.
SOURCE 1
SOURCE 2
Ah! She's a Brave and Hunger Games fan lol! Flawless Queen speaking the truth. They really do need to fix the way women are portrayed in the media. Shows like 'Two Broke Girls' and 'Whitney' aren't helping imo. And yes, I'm sorry to say, neither is Real Housewives (I'm sorry!)
(Though The Fly is still my favorite movie of hers. Sorry, Geena.)
THISSSSSSSSSSSS. It is amazing to me how much people think I am being ~dramatic~
I see this all the time just working at a video rental place. Boys will whine if their sister picks out a "girl movie" so the parent makes her put it back and pick out something "they both can watch." (i.e. something with a BOY main character. Like Bolt.)
Yeah, it's a little thing but it leads to BIG THINGS.
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