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THE THIRD GLOBAL SYMPOSIUM ON GENDER IN MEDIA A transcript of the Third Global Symposium on Gender in Media held on Tuesday, November 13, 2012 at SLS Hotel, Beverly Hills www.seejane.org GEENA DAVIS INSTITUTE ON GENDER IN MEDIA THIRD SYMPOSIUM ON GENDER IN MEDIA 2012 PROGRAM OVERVIEW WELCOME AND OPENING ADDRESS Madeline Di Nonno Executive Director, Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media KEYNOTE SPEAKERS Geena Davis Founder, Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media Stacy L. Smith, Ph.D. Associate Professor, USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism PANEL Modeling Success for Girls in TV and Film How kid-centric film and TV shows are helping to shape how girls see themselves as adults tomorrow MODERATOR Maria Hall Brown, Executive Producer for Arts and Culture Programming on PBS SoCal Panelists Bonnie Arnold, Producer, Toy Story, How to Train Your Dragon, DreamWorks Animation Kim Berglund, Director, Children’s Programming, PBS Kids Michelle Murdocca, Producer, Hotel Transylvania, Sony Animation Chris Nee, Writer/Producer, Creator of Disney Junior’s Doc McStuffins Halle Stanford, Executive Vice President of Children’s Entertainment, The Jim Henson Company PANEL Women, Media and Culture: How media can play a leading role in advocating and positively shaping cultural views on women’s value in a global society. MODERATOR Mary McNamara, Los Angeles Times Television Critic Panelists Meredith Averill, Executive Story Editor, The Good Wife, CBS Ingrid Haas, Writer/Producer/Actor Nicole Newnham Producer, Revolutionary Optimist Amy Ziering, Producer, The Invisible War CLOSING COMMENTS Geena Davis www.seejane.org 2 GEENA DAVIS INSTITUTE ON GENDER IN MEDIA THIRD SYMPOSIUM ON GENDER IN MEDIA 2012 In a few minutes you are going to hear from our distinguished keynote speakers Geena Davis and Dr. Stacy Smith. Dr. Smith is going to present groundbreaking research on the career occupations and aspirations of female characters in popular TV and film. We also are THE THIRD GLOBAL SYMPOSIUM super thrilled that we have two panels of exceptional entertainment executives that are leading by ON GENDER IN MEDIA 2012 example by dramatically changing the cultural landscape of media images for women and girls. Although their experiences may vary from your Madeline Di Nonno Welcome. own, I think one thing we all have in common I’m Madeline Di Nonno and is our passion and tireless commitment to achieve I’m the Executive Director gender equality and the e powerment of women for the Institute. Thank you so and girls in popular media. So without further ado, much for taking the time to I would like to introduce our fearless leader and join us. Institute founder, Academy Award winning actor, The one thing Geena Davis. Thank you so much for your help. that unites We want to thank our Board of Advisors and our Platinum “all of us is our Sponsors: ITVS, the Corpora- passion and tion for Public Broadcasting, Zion’s Bank and Variety. tireless commitment to gender equality We are so pleased to be partners with ITVS and their Women and Girls Lead Campaign. This video, which and the you just saw, is part of our Guess Who Children’s empowerment Education Program which is designed to teach children to challenge gender stereotypes. Today, of women you’re going to see a few other videos that were and girls. produced by students from USC. This one was actu- ally Boston University. We have Columbia College in — Madeline Di Nonno” Chicago and Lipscomb Universities. So our friends at PBS are going to air these spots nationally in March. So, of course, in L.A. it will be on PBS SoCal. Somewhere in this crowd is Mel Rogers. There you are! Thank you so much for your help. www.seejane.org 3 GEENA DAVIS INSTITUTE ON GENDER IN MEDIA THIRD SYMPOSIUM ON GENDER IN MEDIA 2012 Geena Davis Thank you very Eventually when I was asked if I thought things were much. I’m thrilled to see all now better for actresses I would say, “I don’t know. of you here. What a fantastic Google it.” turnout! So many friends and colleagues and supporters. So about eight years ago my daughter Alizeh Some of you are new to us was two years old and I started watching some and some of you have been G-rated videos and kids shows with her. I was with us for the long haul. absolutely floored to see, with notable exceptions in preschool shows for kids, what seemed to be I first want to thank very much a huge imbalance in the ratio of male to female our host committee who have characters in this entertainment that was aimed at had unflagging generosity and support. Vincent kids. There was a startling dearth of female presence Bruzzese, the Honorable Patricia Harrison, Kevin in the worlds – the fantasy worlds that were being Huvane, Gerry Laybourne, Amy Pascal and Nina created. Tassler. We are deeply honored and very lucky to have their support. I thought if this is what our littlest kids are seeing from the very beginning, what message is it send- As most of you know, we have now sponsored ing to boys and girls about the importance of girls? the largest amount of research ever done on As a parent I thought surely, in the 21st century, we gender depictions in media. It covers a 20 year span. should be showing kids, boys and girls sharing the We couldn’t have done it without the encourage- sandbox equally. ment and the support of the entertainment industry. Surely, in the 21st century, Starting a research institute was really never part of “we should be my master plan, I don’t think. Not that I can recall. But certain things have inexorably led me to this place. seeing boys When I started out in the business I knew quite well, obviously, as everyone did that there were fewer and girls parts for women. But it seemed like interviewers were sharing the were constantly asking me, “Things are better now for women, aren’t they?” I’d answer, “I guess, yeah. sandbox I don’t know.” equally. But as time went on and hit movie after hit movie So I decided I wanted the data. I wanted to really — Geena Davis came out starring women and it didn’t lead to more know that if what I believed I was seeing was true. ” women starring women as all the press predicted – That was how all of this started. Since then we have after A League of Their Own which was 20 years ago sponsored almost 20 discrete studies conducted at this year. I like to bring up my credits. I think since then USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and there have been no women sport’s movies. Journalism by Dr. Stacy Smith who you will meet very briefly. www.seejane.org 4 GEENA DAVIS INSTITUTE ON GENDER IN MEDIA THIRD SYMPOSIUM ON GENDER IN MEDIA 2012 We looked both at the quality and the quantity of in your program guide. the female characters and the results have been stunning. By reflecting to children a very, very So, the majority of those studied had indeed utilized imbalanced culture from the very beginning, we what they learned through the Institute with close are in fact unconsciously training kids to see girls to half having done so in three or more projects. and women as less important than men and boys. 68% of The message is sinking in. There is a study that shows When asked in how many projects they had the more hours of television a girl watches, the fewer incorporated these learnings, one-third had done entertainment options she thinks she has in life. This is a very stark and so in one project, 27% in two projects, 16% in three “industry powerful result. projects and 25% had included them in four or more projects. The older the respondents were, the more executives You’re going to hear shortly about why that might likely they were to have incorporated our data into exposed to our happen – that by watching female characters their projects with 36% of those 50 and older incorpo- girl’s ambitions become more limited. We are rating learning into four or more projects. research have going to share with you for the first time some utilized what research today and Stacy will be explaining that. When asked what they had changed about their That’s our story. Fortunately for us, a lot of you have projects, over a quarter changed the aspirations they learned shared your stories with us. and occupations of the female characters or in three they changed their dialogue. 18% had changed Following our last Symposium we sent out a story development and 16% had increased female or more survey and asked if our findings would impact your characters as secondary characters. One in 10 had projects. upcoming projects and your work and if you would increased female characters as lead characters. share what you learned with your colleagues. Over They had changed the look of the characters or they — Geena Davis 90% said yes to both. To find out our specific impact had switched male to female characters – 11% had ” on what’s being made, we recently conducted done that. a very comprehensive survey asking all of the These are some other direct impacts from their executives and con- responses. Some said they hired more female talent. tent creators that we They tried to employ more women on the crew as presented to in what writers or musicians. They also worked with creators to ways have we made create content that show females driving story and an impact on your which shows males in non-traditional roles.

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