Women and Media: International Perspectives - Essay Example

1. Ross, K & Byerly, C M (eds) 2004, Women and media: International perspectives, John Wiley & Sons, New York. Edited by Ross and Byerly (2004), this book brings together eight international academics to explore critical issues of the relationship between gender and media. The book is divided into two parts: Part 1 – Representing and Consuming Women and Part 2 – Women’s Agency in Media Production. Part 1 has five chapters that are dedicated to how women are depicted in the society, particularly with regard to issues such as media reporting of sexual aggression against women and minors, exclusion and marginalisation of women and how women are depicted in Israel, gendered perspectives in mediated political affairs, and depiction of the woman as a warrior with regard to the political and economic arena. The second part has five chapters which focus on the role of women in newsrooms, access to employment and decision making in media, women’s alternative radio, and the role of the woman in cyberspace. This book is particularly important as a source of information on studies involving new media and the rights of women because while there is much hype about new media, women and the poor are increasingly left behind in their use. This means that gender and socioeconomic equality have to be ensured before these marginalised groups can be empowered to use ICT effectively for their own advancement (p. 4). According to the introduction of the book, the aim of assembling the collection of authors who wrote the various chapters was the understanding that women’s efforts to better understand and discipline the media have always been associated with women’s right to self-determination, especially the right of women to communicate. This will be important in analysing the role of new media and women’s self-determination. 2. Nazir, S & Tomppert, L (eds) 2005, Women's rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Citizenship and justice, Rowman & Littlefield, Oxford. This book was written by authors from Freedom House, an international organisation involved in promoting free institutions the world over. The first chapter of the book was written by Sameena Nazir and is about challenging inequality and focuses on the obstacles and opportunities towards the rights of women in North Africa and in the Middle East. This chapter states the unequal status of women is a formidable challenge to democratic change in Arab North Africa and the Middle East, and there is a considerable deficit in the rights of women in many areas including media, law, education, the criminal justice system and many others. The second chapter is about the impact of public attitudes. For instance, there is an assertion that media revolution generates new openings for shifting societal perspectives towards the rights of women. The book identifies Kuwait, Egypt and Morocco as some of the countries witnessing a complex change in the media, with a large proportion of the public now able to access an extensive selection of programmes. The second chapter also addresses other issues that relate to the rights of women such as education and roles in society. In the regions addressed, men and women are believed to have different roles in society, with women perceived as responsible largely for home affairs. However, it also indicated that women’s improved access to learning and greater involvement in the labour force are driving people to rethink the gender-defined responsibilities. In many cases however, certain stereotypes continue to hinder women’s full equity. Another chapter of the book presents country reports on Egypt, Algeria, Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, Lebanon, Oman, Bahrain, Morocco, Palestine, Qatar, Syria, Libya, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Tunisia, and Yemen based on a comparative assessment of women’s rights in these nations. The book will help in comparison of women’s rights in various Arabic countries. 3. Chambers, D, Steiner, L & Fleming, C 2004, Women and journalism, Routledge, New York. Women and Journalism offers a detailed scrutiny of the roles, position and encounters of female journalists in the United Kingdom and the United States. Using information from various sources, the authors examine the challenges women have experienced in their efforts to become established in the career from the mid-19th century and later on. With a special focus on news journalism, the book offers a description of the gendered structuring of journalism in radio, print, and television and conjectures about women’s role in the new sector of online journalism. The book is divided into 12 chapters. The first four chapters give a historical account of women’s experiences in media, with the third and fourth chapters explaining the education and training of women journalists and how women fared with men in journalism. Chapter 6 details women’s challenges with respect to sexism and discrimination and how women began to reorganise. The later chapters give an account of women and their rights especially with regard to women war correspondents and reporting on lesbianism. Chapter 11 of the book covers postmodern journalism and its corollaries for women. Issues such as the sexualisation of news and judging of women TV news presenters by their looks are addressed in this chapter. The 12th chapter is the conclusion and discusses women, journalism and new media. This offers a perspective on the features of gendered structuring of journalism and gender and online journalism among others. The book is important as a source of information for the study topic because its chapters address issues such as women’s rights of expression and communication. 4. Kerr, J, Sprenger, E & Symington, A (eds) 2005, The future of women's rights: Global visions and strategies, Zed Books, London. This book highlights the surfacing of various developments that threaten the advancement of gender equality, women’s rights as well as sustainable development. These issues include the impacts of globalisation and neoliberal economics, advances in biotechnology, the neo-conservative reaction against women’s rights, monopolistic patterns of ownership over information technologies, the advent of identity politics that marginalise women’s issues, and the rise in violent conflicts and war. The book’s contributors are united in perceiving a pressing need for women’s movements to examine their methods, with an objective of making their future political work more effective. They highlight current trends and issues in the world, reflecting how these may affect women and the work of women’s movements. The book is divided into 13 chapters with contributions from different authors. The first chapter, which is the introduction, addresses the future of women’s rights. It addresses the fact that to be at the heart of global change, feminists require visions of alternative futures and transformative processes by which they can bring about a more just and equal world. Chapters 2-4 deal with the changing perceptions feminism around the globe and especially the role of the woman in the 21st century. Chapter 10, which is titled Globalisation and reinventing the politics of a women’s movement particularly indicates that the misrepresentations of women such as gender stereotyping and negative portrayals of girls and women in the media have not been overcome (p. 158). Further, the writers point out that “women have not yet used new media, communications technologies, and public relations methods to counter the daily onslaught of negative media images that are detrimental to women, especially young women” (p. 159). This source will therefore support the study in finding the extent to which women use new media and how they are portrayed in such media. 5. Alfredsson, G & Tomaševski, K 1995, A thematic guide to documents on the human rights of women: Global and regional standards adopted by intergovernmental organisations, international non-governmental organizations, and professional associations, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Hague. As a guide, the book is aimed to enable orientation in the standards of human rights by highlighting the elements of substantive standards in an organised way. Part 1 of the book groups the relevant provisions from different instruments in accordance with particular freedoms and rights. Part 2 offers a sequential list of all the tools that are stated in part 1, enabling the user to find the entire document if need be. The third part of the book has a wide-ranging index of all significant provisions. The book particularly states that people not familiar with human rights standards and procedures are often influenced by the media, which consistently criticises human rights violations (p. x). As well, the book states that there is need to encourage education of people to increase their freedom of expression and access to communication media as this will raise their understanding and awareness of all features of social integration, including gender sensitivity (p. 289). The book offers recommendations on what governments need to do to promote equality between men and women in printed and electronic media (p. 292). This book is thus an important source of information because it identifies the equalities that have existed in regard to women’ rights and the media and offers possible solutions to remove these inequalities. 6. Mellor, N, Rinnawi, K, Dajani, N & Ayish, M I 2011, Arab media, Polity, New York. This book offers a clear and authoritative introduction to the emerging Arab media industries in the perspective of globalisation and its consequences, with a focus the press, publishing, cinema, broadcasting and new media. By providing detailed discussions of the regulation and economic aspects of these industries, the authors argue that the political, cultural and technological changes on the global media scene have resulted in the reorganisation of the Arab media arena. They offer striking exemplars of this through the particular impact on media policies, media technology and content genres created for the new generation of media consumers. The book also identifies the cultural unifiers and diversifiers among Arab populations across the Middle East. This book is selected for this research because it states that women’s organisations in the Arab world are among the winners of the new media, as they use the Internet to propagate their causes. This is because the Internet works well in exposing their issues to the public, especially with respect to gender empowerment and to act for obtaining women’s rights (p. 139). This book important is as a source of information as it highlights the role played by women’s organisations in fighting for women’s rights. It is especially fascinating because as it has been noted in other sources women are not utilising new media as much as men, yet in the Arab world the Internet is one of the media frequently used by women’s organisations to pursue their rights. 7. The International Women’s Media Foundation (IWMF) IWMF’s mission is to reinforce the position of women in the news media the world over. The organisation was founded in 1990 and is dedicated to empowering women working in the news media as a way of furthering freedom of the press. It achieves its mission through four strategies: building a vibrant network, cultivating effective leaders, pioneering change, and honouring courage. IWMF’s website is an important source of information on new media and women’s rights because it focuses on a network of women as the core of its work. The association allows women in news media to come together in new modes to share thoughts, strategies, resources, as well as career information. By developing effective leaders, the organisation ensures that women have the skills that they need to succeed in their careers and this is one way of strengthening their rights. It is also noteworthy that IWMF has a reputation of developing ground-breaking training that enables journalists to report on international topics, which improves the wellbeing of those involved and creates opportunities for female personalities in the news media to develop and advance their careers. This website’s content will therefore be essential as the intended research attempts to provide answers to the challenges highlighted in the other sources with regards to the rights of women. The source is important given that it is a form of new media in itself. 8. Safeworld International Foundation (www.asafeworldforwomen.org) Safeworld International Foundation is a women-led NGO registered in the UK. The organisation partners with grassroots organisations to encourage women’s empowerment as well as sustainable development, deal with the root causes of oppression and poverty, and bring about positive economic and social change at a global level. According to the organisation’s website, the website is very popular and links women and women’s organisations from different cultures and backgrounds so as to enhance dialogue and collaboration on critical issues affecting women and children. This source is vital for availing information regarding women’s rights as it is a form of new media. It is particularly important because it brings together women and women’s organisations to discuss the problems that affect women and how such problems can be solved to foster development. The organisation notes that it has community groups and organisations referred to as Safeworld Field Partners, who work with women and children at a regional level to address issues such as domestic violence, poverty, HIV/AIDS, rape, social and cultural exclusion, marginalisation, isolation and stigmatisation. These are issues that directly pertain to women’s rights. Therefore, while some sources have stated that many women still have little access to new media, this source will offer a different standpoint since it shows how new media is actually being used to fight for the rights of women and to foster women’s development. It will corroborate Mellor et al’s (2011) point that many women’s organisations are using online platforms to put their message across regarding their rights – a point that is also notable on the IWMF website. Essay on the research project The research project is premised on the thinking that in spite of the advent of new media platforms, women in many regions of the world are still marginalised and do not have adequate access to such media. Thus, their rights are continuously being violated and matters that concern them are not reported as they should. For instance, the book edited by Ross and Byerly (2004) reports of issues such as media reporting of sexual violations against children and women, exclusion and marginalisation of women and how women are depicted in Israel, which has meant that women are excluded in the country’s politics (Lemish, 2004, p. 40). In Israel, women’s representation in the Knesset (Parliament) has fluctuated between 6.6 percent and 13 percent according to Lemish (2004, p. 40). This means that women are underrepresented in the country’s politics and as such they do not have front runners to fight for their rights both in parliament and in the media. The same scenario is reflected elsewhere in Arab countries where women are depicted in the media as being primarily responsible for the home and family life and thus do not have a say elsewhere. The research will therefore aim to unravel the obstacles and opportunities for women as far as new media and their rights are concerned. A major obstacle to women’s access to new media is that many of them are poor or uneducated and do not have access to new media platforms (Ross & Byerly, 2004, p. 4). This means that for women to be actively engaged in using new media to promote their rights, there is need for socioeconomic equality to be ensured before the marginalised groups can be empowered to use facilities such as ICT. The research will therefore look into how this can be achieved. There is no doubt that increasing women’s education particularly in the use of ICT will increase their contribution in using new media as noted by Alfredsson and Tomaševski (1995). The book edited by Nazir and Tomppert (2005) notes that better access to learning and greater involvement of women in the workforce progressively leads people to reconsider their perceptions of gender-defined roles. Nevertheless, stereotyping of women still continues to hamper women’s full equity. As such it is necessary to restructure the role of women in the media as noted by Chambers, Steiner and Fleming (2004). As noted by Griffen in the book edited by Kerr, Sprenger and Symington, misrepresentations of women such as stereotyping of gender as well as negative depictions of women and girls are still rife even in the current world with many forms of new media. In particular, the authors note that women have not yet utilised “new media, communications technologies and public relations methods to counter the daily onslaught of negative media images that are detrimental to women” (p. 159). This means that even with the existence of new media, women are not emancipated if they do not take a leading role to challenge any negative portrayals of them using such media. It will therefore be important to examine the ways in which women can actively engage in using new media. How can women actively use new media to promote their rights? This is begging question given that in today’s modern world there are many ways to communicate to audiences other the traditional TV, radio and print media. The Internet offers a platform for various groups to express their views and share them with audiences across the world. Since other forms of reaching people such as having female representatives in parliament are still challenging even in countries such as Israel, the Internet offers the best platform for women and women’s group to engage each other and the public. The import of using the Internet cannot be gainsaid going by the events that characterised the Arab Spring that started in 2010, in which street protests against oppressive regimes were supported by messages posted on social media such as Facebook. Mellor et al (2011) give an account of how new media has helped women in Arab countries to fight for their rights. According to this source, women’s organisations in the Arab world are winners in as far as Internet use is concerned because they are using websites to expose their issues to the public, especially those that concern gender empowerment and promoting women’s rights. This means that in a situation comparable to the Arab Spring, women are not resting on their laurels and waiting for some representative to air their issues to the government or to the world since they have a direct way of doing so through new media. It also means that women in many countries are increasingly gaining more access to education especially with regard to ICT. There is more evidence that many women’s organisations are going online to address issues that affect women. Two organisations, IWMF and the Safeworld International Foundation are noteworthy in this regard. IWMF focuses on a network of women as the core of its work and enables the women to together to share ideas, resources, strategies and career advice. By developing effective leaders, the organisation ensures that women have the skills that they need to be successful in their careers and this ensures that more and more women are able to promote their rights. IWMF also creates training opportunities and this means that women who interact with the organisation are better placed to perceive the issues that affect them and instances in which their rights are deprived. Along the same scope, the Safeworld International Foundation promotes women’s rights by encouraging the empowerment of women so that they can deal with the root causes of oppression and poverty, and bring positive social and economic change to the society. The organisation also addresses issues such as domestic violence, poverty, HIV/AIDS, rape, social and cultural exclusion, marginalisation, isolation and stigmatisation which directly affect women. These two websites are an embodiment of the fact that despite the deprivation that women have faced in the past especially in regard to their portrayal in the media, new media has provided a new platform for them to ventilate on the issues that affect them. In conclusion, the research project will reveal the issues that have denied women an equal opportunity in the media and address the possible solutions to these issues. It is also notable that new media have provided women a new platform to express themselves and promote their rights even when the society denies them representation in institutions such as parliament. This is clear in the Arab nations where women’s organisations are actively using the Internet to air their views. The two websites mentioned also provide evidence that it is possible for women to promote their rights by actively using new media and particularly ICT. References Alfredsson, G & Tomaševski, K 1995, A thematic guide to documents on the human rights of women: Global and regional standards adopted by intergovernmental organisations, international non-governmental organizations, and professional associations, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Hague. Chambers, D, Steiner, L & Fleming, C 2004, Women and journalism, Routledge, New York. Griffen, V, ‘Globalisation and reinventing the politics of a women’s movement,’ In Kerr, J, Sprenger, E & Symington, A (eds) 2005, The future of women's rights: Global visions and strategies, Zed Books, London. International Women’s Media Foundation (IWMF) 2012, viewed 16 August 2012 Lemish, D 2004, ‘Portrayals of women in Israeli media’ in Ross, K & Byerly, C M (eds), Women and media: International perspectives, John Wiley & Sons, New York. Mellor, N, Rinnawi, K, Dajani, N & Ayish, M I 2011, Arab Media, Polity, New York. Ross, K & Byerly, C M (eds) 2004, Women and media: International perspectives, John Wiley & Sons, New York. Safeworld International Foundation, viewed 16 August 2012 Read More