Animating Women

In January, 2007, Geena Davis addresssed The National Conference for Media Reform of not only her experiences acting in Thelman and Louise and A League of Their Own, but importantly the gender disparity in G-rated Feature films including animated features.

Whilst watching television with her young daughter, Geena observed the lack of female roles in cartoons, animations and in general childrens programming. As a result Geena founded See Jane: a non-profit organisation that “seeks to engage professionals and parents in a call to dramatically increase the percentages of female characters - and to reduce gender stereotyping - in media made for children 11 and under.”

Watch Geena Davis below from YouTube:-

The Research: 
The See Jane organisation has completed extensive research on female roles in approx. 100 G-rated feature films and has subsequently released its findings in the paper: Where the Girls Aren’t: Gender Disparity Saturates G-Rated Films.

Key findings show that:

• In the 101 studied films, there are three male characters for every one female character.
• Fewer than one out of three (28 percent) of the speaking characters (both real and animated) are female.
• Fewer than one in five (17 percent) of the characters in crowd scenes are female.
• More than four out of five (83 percent) of the films’ narrators are male

“Gender equity has progressed in many ways, but male characters still dominate television, movies, and other media for young children. Since women and girls make up half of the human race, the presence of a wide variety of female characters in our children’s earliest media is essential for both girls’ and boys’ development.” from See Jane.org

Posted on April 7th, 2007 by animatingwomen
Filed under: Geena Davis Research