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Thursday, April 29, 2021
"Six Men for Every Four Women": Gender Inequalities in Theatre Programming Revealed in New Cross-Europe Study
The Theatre Times: Gender Equality and Diversity in European Theatres, a study by the European Theatre Convention (ETC), finds that four women are mentioned in theatre programmes for every six men—and that men dominate job categories of playwright, director, and technical staff, while women hold more than 70% of the positions of “costumes” and “hairdressing.”
Gender inequality is a pretty common phenomenon in almost every field, unfortunately. The fact that the most female dominated positions in theater is costumes and hairdressing is very distressing. It makes me rather proud of my class of DPs. I was surprised when I met my classmates and the vast majority of them were women. I love that the only prospective technical directors, as far as I am aware, are women, despite it being such a male-dominated career. I also think it's funny that the majority of our costume designers are men. One issue mentioned in this article that stuck out to me, though, is the near absence of trans artists in theater. As a trans person, it is awfully discouraging not seeing yourself in the field you want to enter, which is maybe why I'm more drawn to working in the queer arts. I do hope, though, that this changes soon and trans folks get more representation.
Before reading this, I have been aware of massive gender inequalities in the entertainment field in general, including theater specifically. The study notices that stereotypically female occupied positions were 70+% women (hair and costumes)– I know I have seen this stereotype over and over again in my own experience. As Jem talked about, our class has had conversations about this; as of now, most of the people interested in technical direction are women and most classmates interested in declaring costumes are men. This trend of ours goes directly against a lot of those stereotypes. Though this article is focused on inequalities within the gender binary, inequalities in theater go way beyond that (which they do mention, though everything was lumped together into a big bucket category they called “minority”). I hope we will continue these conversations and start taking real, concrete steps to help create a more equitable work field.
In the past decade or so gender inequality in theatre has definitely lessened but not to the degree it should have by where we are as a society. As it stands, it's crazy for me to believe that customarily women heavy fields such as costumes are still 70% women while other more technical or hierarchically strong positions like director and TD are severely dominated by men. Most of my time at CMU I was strongly conflicted between whether I wanted to follow the SM/PM track or the TD track. And while there were of course many other factors involved in that uncertainty one of the big ones was gender norms and expectations in those two differing fields. Even when I spoke to my advisor about wanting to be a TD she cautioned me about sexist work environments and urged me to speak to current female TDs before making my decision. And unfortunately, that was already something I was worried about based on how a handful of individuals had treated me on crews both here and in past environments. I hope one day in the near future these aren't even considerations for people as they choose their fields. Whether you think you'll be discriminated against should never be a reason that keeps you from work you enjoy.
Honestly this article told me nothing new. I think the fact that the industry is full of men and women are told to deal with the sexism is part of the problem. Although this is all industries in the world I can not help but think how ironic it is for theatre to be such an inclusive thing on the high school level only for the opposite to happen professionally. As a women who wants to be a TD I have dealt with my fair share of sexism and even people who are not directly working with me have said comments to me or have not understood the amount of sexism I have faced with the minimal amount of experience I have now. Things like that are as simple as in high school during strikes dads would come up to me and ask to see the TD and when I would tell them that I am in charge of this strike they would proceed to ask for the person that was actually running it. A few moments later they would try to teach me how to use a tool or where to put it away when I was the one that organized them in the first place. I think the industry as a ton of work moving forward and honestly that scares me as a woman TD but this is something I love to do. This industry cant move forward until ALL genders are seen as valid and capable not just men not just women.
4 comments:
Gender inequality is a pretty common phenomenon in almost every field, unfortunately. The fact that the most female dominated positions in theater is costumes and hairdressing is very distressing. It makes me rather proud of my class of DPs. I was surprised when I met my classmates and the vast majority of them were women. I love that the only prospective technical directors, as far as I am aware, are women, despite it being such a male-dominated career. I also think it's funny that the majority of our costume designers are men. One issue mentioned in this article that stuck out to me, though, is the near absence of trans artists in theater. As a trans person, it is awfully discouraging not seeing yourself in the field you want to enter, which is maybe why I'm more drawn to working in the queer arts. I do hope, though, that this changes soon and trans folks get more representation.
Before reading this, I have been aware of massive gender inequalities in the entertainment field in general, including theater specifically. The study notices that stereotypically female occupied positions were 70+% women (hair and costumes)– I know I have seen this stereotype over and over again in my own experience. As Jem talked about, our class has had conversations about this; as of now, most of the people interested in technical direction are women and most classmates interested in declaring costumes are men. This trend of ours goes directly against a lot of those stereotypes. Though this article is focused on inequalities within the gender binary, inequalities in theater go way beyond that (which they do mention, though everything was lumped together into a big bucket category they called “minority”). I hope we will continue these conversations and start taking real, concrete steps to help create a more equitable work field.
In the past decade or so gender inequality in theatre has definitely lessened but not to the degree it should have by where we are as a society. As it stands, it's crazy for me to believe that customarily women heavy fields such as costumes are still 70% women while other more technical or hierarchically strong positions like director and TD are severely dominated by men. Most of my time at CMU I was strongly conflicted between whether I wanted to follow the SM/PM track or the TD track. And while there were of course many other factors involved in that uncertainty one of the big ones was gender norms and expectations in those two differing fields. Even when I spoke to my advisor about wanting to be a TD she cautioned me about sexist work environments and urged me to speak to current female TDs before making my decision. And unfortunately, that was already something I was worried about based on how a handful of individuals had treated me on crews both here and in past environments. I hope one day in the near future these aren't even considerations for people as they choose their fields. Whether you think you'll be discriminated against should never be a reason that keeps you from work you enjoy.
Honestly this article told me nothing new. I think the fact that the industry is full of men and women are told to deal with the sexism is part of the problem. Although this is all industries in the world I can not help but think how ironic it is for theatre to be such an inclusive thing on the high school level only for the opposite to happen professionally. As a women who wants to be a TD I have dealt with my fair share of sexism and even people who are not directly working with me have said comments to me or have not understood the amount of sexism I have faced with the minimal amount of experience I have now. Things like that are as simple as in high school during strikes dads would come up to me and ask to see the TD and when I would tell them that I am in charge of this strike they would proceed to ask for the person that was actually running it. A few moments later they would try to teach me how to use a tool or where to put it away when I was the one that organized them in the first place. I think the industry as a ton of work moving forward and honestly that scares me as a woman TD but this is something I love to do. This industry cant move forward until ALL genders are seen as valid and capable not just men not just women.
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