Women in media

Women are highly under-represented in Maltese media according to the results of an international study published by the Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP). Juan Ameen writes:

..On 16 February 2005, 76 countries participating in the Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP) 2005 project monitored the role and representation of women in almost 13,000 stories in TV, radio and newspapers. It is essential for Malta take part in the GMMP every five years, the report said, “as it plays a crucial part in providing invaluable data for Malta and other countries”..

The University of Malta and the Malta Broadcasting Authority participated in the project because “there is an awareness of the importance of understanding the issues of gender balance in the news and in the media in general”. Furthermore, the report said, there is “an awareness of the need to have access to reliable data”. University lecturer specialising in gender studies Brenda Murphy was the local project coordinator..

..This discrepancy is consistent across all media – TV, radio and newspapers – with female subjects least represented in newspapers, the report said. Across all three media, 62 per cent of women were presenters, 19 per cent were reporters and 17 per cent were subjects. In television, 20 per cent of news subjects were women, 18 per cent in radio and 13 per cent in newspapers. The highest percentage of female news subjects per topic was registered in crime and violence (49 per cent), followed by politics and government (22 per cent)..

..According to the results, women only dominate in the role of presenter on TV and radio and that all three media showed a greater dominance of male journalists. Female journalists were least likely to report on topics in politics and government (0.4 per cent), and most likely to report on health and science (50 per cent). Only 0.7 per cent of monitored news stories challenge gender stereotypes in the media, while 2.2 per cent actually reinforce these stereotypes. The report found that most of the media is stereotypical, depicting women as victims and helpless figures. The overwhelming majority (99 per cent) of news stories monitored did not highlight the issue of gender equality or inequality – stories that did only made up less than one per cent.