Women continue to play visible role in revolutions

Joy BaconLeave a comment

As upheaval continues across the Middle East, women have stayed in prominent positions in protests in many countries throughout the region.

As we’ve covered in earlier posts, women played crucial roles in political revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia. Now as violence continues in other countries, women have followed suit and stepped into the spotlight. This week in Yemen, thousands gathered to march in honor of Tawakkol Karman, who recently won the Nobel Peace Prize (along with two other women) for her work, the first Arab woman to receive the honor. Karman had played a key role as an Islamic journalist in Yemen’s political revolution. During the marches, dozens were injured as pro-government gangs attacked the women with rocks and batons.

According to CNN, female protesters marched in three Yemeni provinces –Taiz, Shabwa and Sanaa. The largest took place in Sanaa where at least 15,000 females marched down the capital’s Cairo Street. The marchers called for the United Nations to impose sanctions against Yemen’s ruling family as well as for Saleh to step down from power. Check out this CNN video for interviews with the women involved:

For more coverage of the Nobel Peace Prize Awards, check out these sources:

This is the Gender Report’s Week in Review, a weekly post that highlights some of the major stories related to gender issues this week. Some of these stories may have already appeared in our News Feed or in the week’s Gender Checks. We’ll at times include a longer analysis of stories as well as bring attention to stories that may have slipped through the cracks of the week’s news cycle.

Gender Check 10/17/11 – South

Joy BaconLeave a comment

Website: The Miami Herald

On the Miami Herald, one of the lead articles featured on the home page as of 10 p.m. (EST) on Monday, Oct. 17 was “University of Miami Med School Gets New Genetic Robot”. Its subject was the acquisition of a robot to aid in research of genetics-related diseases.

Here is its gender breakdown:

–Author: Male

–Human sources (listed in order mentioned):

  1. Male – dean of medical school
  2. Female – director of genetics research institute
  3. Male – medical expert

Notes/Analysis: The photo accompanying this story was of the male dean of the medical school, also used as a source.

Website: Patch (Seminole Heights)

On Patch of Seminole Heights, one of the lead articles featured on the home page as of 10 p.m. (EST) on Monday, October 17 was titled “‘Patch is Polling Local Republicans.” Its subject was a partnership with the Huffington Post to precede the 2012 Repbulican convention in Tampa.

Here is its gender breakdown:

–Author: unknown

–Human sources (listed in order mentioned)

none

Notes/Analysis: All of the lead stories were posted as opinion pieces, which we do not typically include in our analysis.

Second month in a row with dismal female byline count in New Media Index stories

Jasmine R. LinabaryLeave a comment

Following a methodology change for the New Media Index reports, The Gender Report has for the second month in a row found the lowest count of female bylines yet, this month coming in at a dismal 9.5 percent.

Here at The Gender Report, we’ve been monitoring the web’s top articles based on links provided in the Project for Excellence in Journalism‘s weekly New Media Index roundups since January. PEJ’s reports the top five news stories and opinion pieces around the web in a Monday to Friday week based on commentary on blogs and social media sites. For the purposes of our study, we’ve chosen to focus on the top five in the blogosphere. When more than one link was provided on the topic, we’ve tried to monitor the first mentioned or the one that appears based on the writing to be more dominant, unless it is mentioned that articles shared the attention for that particular subject.

As we mentioned last month, August marked some changes to the New Media Index’s methodology, including the use of more sites to track the top stories as well as using a larger sample size and range of sources. (Read more about those change and the process here.) As a result, we’ve continued to notice changes in link diversity (particularly from blogs) and in topics, with more technology topics making it into the top five. As we’ve seen so far, this has meant a decrease in the number of sources and the percentage of female bylines. We’ll be continuing to monitor the differences in our results for the months following this methodology change.

Here’s what we found in the past month:

September 2011

PEJ New Media Index: September 26-30, 2011
Between Sept. 5 and Sept. 30, the New Media Index included 24 articles that could be checked. News regarding the new iPhone, usually from tech blogs, appeared every week in the top five. An apology message from Netflix CEO Reed Hastings regarding recent changes to the company’s services appeared in the top five two weeks in a row but is only counted once here. For three top stories during this time, no specific link was provided. Those topics were Facebook (No. 3, Sept 26-30), Google News (No. 3, Sept. 5-9), and Carol Bartz ousted from Yahoo (No. 4, Sept. 5-9).

In the stories we were able to monitor, here’s what we found:

  • Women were 17.6 percent of sources in this month’s articles. The articles contained 28 male sources and 6 female sources.
  • Half of the articles contained no human sources. Nearly all of those links were to blog posts with two coming from opinion columns. In addition, four articles featured only male sources.
  • Only two articles or posts were written or produced by a woman while 19 articles were by one or more man. That means women wrote only 9.5 percent of articles or posts by authors of one gender or the other. One article was by a male and female. Two were by staff. This tops last month’s eight-month low of female bylines, which was at 10 percent.

We’ll be keeping an eye on these findings in the coming months to see if we deduce other trends emerging now that the methodology for the top five articles has changed. For past months’ findings as well as other statistics on gender and the online news, visit our findings and statistics page or view our six-month recap of all of our projects and studies here.

Gender check: 10/13/11 – Midwest

Jasmine R. LinabaryLeave a comment

*Gender Checks are quick examinations of gender representation in individual news articles for the purpose of discovering trends over time. Click here to read more.

Website: St. Louis Post-Dispatch (stltoday.com)

"Missouri legislators pledge to push child care safety" - Stltoday.com, 10/13/2011

On Stltoday.com, one of the lead articles featured on the home page as of 9:40 a.m. (PDT) Thursday, Oct. 13, was titled “Missouri legislators pledge to push child care safety.” Its subject was a pledge by legislators to put two child care safety measures up in the next session.

Here is its gender breakdown:

–Author: Female

–Human sources  (listed in order mentioned):

  1. Male, state senator (R)
  2. Female, state representative (D)
  3. Male, governor
  4. Female, former state representative (R)
  5. Male, state representative (R)
  6. Female, chief executive officer of Child Care Aware of Missouri

Notes/analysis: The article notes that this response came after a series by the Post-Dispatch that “detailed 45 mostly preventable deaths in Missouri child care facilities from 2007 through 2010.” That series is called “Deadly Day Cares.”


Website: St. Louis Beacon

On the St. Louis Beacon, one of the lead articles featured on the home page as of 9:40 a.m. (PDT) Thursday, Oct. 13, was titled “Internship program helps introduce high school students to world of work.” It was a feature on an internship program that is getting ready to celebrate 20 years.

Here is its gender breakdown:

–Author: Male

–Human sources  (listed in order mentioned):

  1. Male, lawyer (program’s inspiration)
  2. Female, program director
  3. Female, junior (participant)
  4. Male, with company involved with the program

Notes/analysis: Article includes two mugshots, both of the story’s female sources.

Gender check: 10/11/11 – West

Jasmine R. LinabaryLeave a comment

*Gender Checks are quick examinations of gender representation in individual news articles for the purpose of discovering trends over time. Click here to read more.

Website: Seattle Times

"Budget woes: Will parolees get a free pass?" - Seattle Times, 10/11/2011

On the Seattle Times, one of the lead articles featured on the home page as of 9:15 a.m. (PDT) Tuesday, Oct. 11, was titled “Budget woes: Will parolees get a free pass?” Its subject was possible effects of drastic cuts outlined by the state Department of Corrections.

Here is its gender breakdown:

–Author: Female

–Human sources  (listed in order mentioned):

  1. Male, corrections spokesman
  2. Male, spokesman for Washington Federation of State Employees
  3. Male, a community corrections supervisor
  4. Female, secretary of union
  5. Male, House Ways and Means committee chairman
  6. Male,  corrections secretary


Website: Seattle P-I

On the Seattle P-I, one of the lead articles featured on the home page as of 9:15 a.m. (PDT) Tuesday, Oct. 11, was titled “No arrests of protesters, despite threats.” Its subject was police officers and the “Occupy Seattle” movement.

Here is its gender breakdown:

–Author: Staff

–Human sources  (listed in order mentioned):

  1. Unknown, staff member of mayor
  2. Male, mayor
  3. Male, protester

Notes/Analysis: The article also includes quotes from posts to the groups’ social media.