Media is a well proven tool to advance gender equality. But most often women are portrayed through stereotypes and global studies show that only 24 per cent of the voices used in media and news items stem from women.
With support from International Media Support and Fojo Media Institute, The Myanmar Women’s Journalists Society (MWJS) is piloting the first study of its kind looking at how women and men are portrayed in media - in the pursuit of greater gender equality in Myanmar.
“Over the past few months, we have developed a thorough methodology that gives us concrete data on how women and men are being portrayed in the news across Myanmar, explains IMS-Fojo gender advisor Ellie Swindon.
“The results of our study will be used to advocate for policies and initiatives that promote new ways of being masculine and feminine and close the gender gap in media content,” says Ellie Swindon and continues: “With the country’s transition to democracy, media holds the opportunity to be a frontrunner in promoting gender equality through inclusive news content. The new study will raise awareness of current trends and presence of gender bias in news reporting. Now is indeed a good moment for us to conduct such a survey with a more mature media sector across the country,” Ellie Swindon finishes.
A professional media that respects gender equity by allocating equal weight to both male and female voices in media can positively contribute to wiping out entrenched prejudices against women and help strengthen the role of women in society.
The study is a pilot, with a view to being replicated and repeated each year, as a way of tracking’s media’s progress on this issue. The aim is to see Myanmar participate in the next ‘Global Media Monitoring Project’ (GMMP) in 2020, which is a worldwide media monitoring, research and advocacy project implemented collaboratively with women’s rights organisations and researchers across the world. The GMMP has been conducted every five years since 1995. In 2015, results for the Asia region generally showed a low awareness of gender sensitive reporting with the second lowest rate of women’s representation in the media in the world at only 20 per cent, only 2 per cent higher than in the Middle East.