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Gender Bias in UK Music: What Instrument to Play?

New research by Encore Musicians has revealed ongoing sexist culture in the UK music industry, and clear gendered differences in instrument choice. 

Encore surveyed 333 of their musicians and asked if they felt certain instruments were dominated by one gender, if they ever felt discouraged from playing an instrument due to their gender, and where they felt the problem stemmed from. 

Some of their key findings revealed:

  • Women musicians (24%) are 4 times more likely to feel discouraged from playing certain instruments due to their gender than men (6%).


  • The guitar ranked as the most male-dominated instrument (34%) and the harp ranked as the most female-dominated instrument (40%). 
  • Sexist comments (27%), lack of women role models (21%), and gender stereotypes (13%) ranked as the top three reasons women musicians felt discouraged from playing certain instruments.
  • Overall, two-thirds (64%) of our musicians felt that some instruments were dominated by one gender but women were 36% more likely to agree with the statement.

The sexist comments ranged from comments such as “girls can’t shred as fast as guys” to one musician being told directly by a male band leader that they “weren’t having a female drummer”. Below are some more experiences from women musicians. 

  • (Flautist) - “Wanted to learn the accordion when I was younger - got told it would harm my 'development' (chest area)”
  • (Bagpiper) - “Comments I get rather a lot, “I wasn’t expecting you to be as good as that when I saw you’re a lady piper” “I was surprised to hear a lady piper play that well!“you’re actually better than the male pipers we saw in Scotland” Then there’s also the general comments on my size/frame/stamina, “where do you hide all that lung power” etc.”
  • (Director) - “As a female director of an ensemble I've experienced my fair share of gender bias and sexism…people asking if this is my "hobby" while my asking male colleagues how they got into this line of "work"

The second biggest reason for women feeling discouraged from certain instruments is the lack of women role models within certain instruments. Echoing the results above, women musicians felt they didn’t see a lot of drummers or guitarists who were women while growing up and feel this may have put them off from trying the instruments. 

  • (Singer) - “I wanted to learn drums as a teenager and was put off by the male-dominated environment of local drum classes”
  • (Flautist) - “I never thought to play bass or drums because I never saw any female role models”
  • (Harpist) - “Never seeing women represented on things like drums, bass, guitar etc as a child made me never consider I could try it”

Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes play a huge role in affecting musicians' choice of musical instrument, with 13% of women and significantly, 80% of men agreeing that this was the most influential factor discouraging them from deciding what to play.

  • (Banjoist) - “Ukulele…was told it was for girls”.
  • (Saxophonist) - “As a boy it wasn’t cool to play woodwind, but times have changed.”
  • (Pianist) - “I thought the flute was for girls as a child.”

These results demonstrate that there is still a gender bias in the music industry when it comes to instrument choices, and we have work to do to ensure that the industry's culture is inclusive and diverse, that women role models are celebrated and valued, and that for children and young people especially, gender stereotypes do not limit choice or self-expression. 

Position Vacant: Communications & Engagement Officer

Closing date: February 12, 2024

Anticipated week of interview: week commencing 4th March

Job Description 

Salary: £29,770.51 pro rata (£22,327.88) 

Pension: 8% employer contribution 

Hours: 0.75 FTE – 26.5 hours / week* 

*Engender is currently trialling a 4-day working week. During this trial working hours have been reduced with no impact on salary (22.5 hours for this post). The outcome of the trial will determine whether Engender adopts this approach longer term.

Leave entitlement: 39 days pro rata (29 days/205 hours*) *176 hours during 4DW trial 

Location: Glasgow or Edinburgh. The post holder will be required to be in the office as needed for meetings and available for occasional events. However, home-based or hybrid working is available outside of these times.

Responsible to: Project Manager, Equal Media and Culture Centre. 

 

Purpose: 

In this role you will work closely with Engender’s Communications team to ensure our work is effectively communicated in innovative and accessible ways to our key audiences – diverse communities of women, women’s and equalities organisations, the media, government and wider civil society. You will be involved in helping shape a wide variety of materials and outputs that support our broader advocacy and campaigning aims. 

This role will also specifically lead on delivering a creative, engaging communications approach and content for Engender’s Equal Media and Culture Centre (EMCC) project. EMCC focuses on gender equality within Scotland’s media and cultural landscape. It researches and monitors issues of equal representation, inclusion, gender stereotyping and women’s right to cultural participation. It also involves collaboration between researchers, the women’s sector, and leaders and creators from the media and cultural industries. 

The role will actively engage our key audiences and partners, particularly diverse groups of women to advance intersectional gender equality, and specifically in the media, creative and cultural sectors in Scotland. The role involves working closely with colleagues from across the Engender team. 

 

Main duties 

Strategic Communications 

  • Supporting the delivery of a communications strategy on Engender’s media and culture work 

  • Engagement with media and culture practitioners, and other audiences

  • Following relevant feminist news, policy and research developments in Scotland and internationally 

  • Working collaboratively with colleagues to maximise the quality and impact of Engender’s overall comms and engagement work 

Co-ordination of external communications

  • Identifying and responding to opportunities to engage media and press

  • Coordinating digital engagement, including social media campaigns

  • Directing content creation including commissioning of blogs, video, podcasts and other outputs 

  • Utilising design software and video editing to create engaging digital content

  • Coordinating the production of publications, ensuring the consistency of branding 

  • Managing website development and maintenance 

Developing and facilitating external engagement

  • Contributing to the delivery of participatory events; online and in person 

  • Representing Engender and EMCC at stakeholder events and other engagement opportunities 

 

General duties

  • Ensuring that the different lived experiences of women in Scotland, particularly those of marginalised women, are reflected in our comms work and that diverse audiences engage with it.

  • Participating in organisational planning and strategy development and team building 

  • Participating in evaluation processes, internal updates and future funding proposals 

 

Person specification 

Essential: 

  • Excellent written communication skills and experience of producing content for a variety of audiences 

  • Experience of coordinating digital communications, including websites and social media, and how to utilise their potential

  • Experience of video-editing 

  • Ability to work collaboratively with a team and partner organisations 

  • Competent in using own initiative, managing work and responding to opportunities effectively 

  • A strong commitment to equality, human rights, and accessibility in communications and engagement

Desirable:

  • Experience in small scale events management 

  • Publishing experience including copy editing and proofreading 

  • Experience of using Canva and other design software 

  • Understanding how to engage and work with the press 

  • Understanding of the media and culture sectors in Scotland 

Equalities statement 

Engender exists to promote women’s equality in Scotland and to challenge the intersecting discrimination that persists in our society and communities. To do this effectively, it is crucial that our team understands and reflects a diversity of perspectives. We therefore encourage and support applications from people from a range of backgrounds, including those that may be under-represented in the Voluntary Sector in Scotland, including but not limited to, people from minority ethnic communities, people with disabilities, LGBTI communities and people who have experienced economic deprivation.

To ensure that our staff thrive and succeed at Engender, we are continuously working to create a workplace that is inclusive, accessible, flexible and fair, and where differences in background, culture, identity and lived experience are valued and respected.

 

Application notes 

If you have any questions, please get in touch via recruitment@engender.org.uk.

Read the application guidance here. 

Closing date: 7am Monday 12th February 2024. 

Anticipated dates for interview: Monday 4th and Tuesday 5th March.

Download this job description and person specification as a PDF here.

Apply for this role on the Engender website here.

Guest post: Reflecting on the National Gathering for Women of Colour in Scotland

In this guest post, gender equality activist and campaigner Anisha Yaseen writes about her experience of attending the National Gathering for Women of Colour in Scotland.

In June 2023 I was fortunate enough to attend a two-day event in Glasgow, organised by Pass The Mic Scotland, which was founded by Talat Yaqoob. Pass the Mic Scotland's mission is to provide opportunities for women of colour to participate in the media industry as experts, commentators and writers. Alongside this, they work to achieve equal representation in a typically white-male dominated industry and policy-influencing space in Scotland.

I cannot emphasise enough how crucial these opportunities are for people, like me, who do not have a starting point and often feel unheard by those in the media industry. As someone who is passionate about campaigning and activism, I found the event both inspiring and exhausting. It is frustrating to see how much harder women, especially women of colour, must work to achieve the same opportunities as our male, white counterparts. Being in a room full of like-minded individuals who share similar experiences was refreshing, but it is equally frustrating that we all share these experiences of being underrepresented and sometimes, misrepresented.

Racism is a pervasive issue that goes far beyond overtly derogatory comments and name-calling, and is deeply ingrained in the very structures of society. It is an unfortunate reality that many women of colour find themselves as the sole representative of their race in meetings and other professional settings, only to have their voices and opinions marginalised.

The media plays a significant role in shaping society’s views and opinions, and it is vital that everyone’s voices are heard. It is essential that women of colour are seen as more than just a diversity checkbox, but instead as individuals with expertise across a range of topics from the economy to education, to the environment. While there has been significant attention given to diversity in the media industry, it is crucial that we move beyond the rhetoric and take tangible steps towards creating a more equitable environment. According to Kaye Nicholson from STV, approaching more women of colour in their area of expertise is a win-win situation. Not only do journalists expand their contacts and find new content, but there is also a better representation of society for their audiences. Ultimately, our goal should be to establish a society that is truly inclusive, and a media sector which tells the stories that represent all of Scotland, engaging a wide range of expertise, regardless of their race or gender.

Some of the discussions over the course of the event included:

  • What media professionals and institutions can learn and do differently.
  • A wide range of people from media were invited and it has been promoted on social media for people to freely register. Yet there was a distinct lack of men in attendance working in and around the media. This was discouraging for many of us and was pointed out many times.
  • The need for diversity and inclusion in media decision-making positions.
  • Experiences of racism and sexism being dismissed.
  • The perpetuation of a deficit model that blames marginalised communities or sees them as lacking in skills. It is crucial to prioritise trust-building with marginalised communities and move towards equality in the media industry and wider policy/political influencing.

As a woman of colour, it is frustrating to feel ignored and marginalised by the media. It’s not okay for the media to represent women of colour without giving them a voice or a chance to share their ideas. Simply including a few people of colour is not enough; their representation must be equal, and their voice heard. It’s important to keep in mind that progress towards inclusivity should never be a reason to become complacent. There is always more work to be done to ensure that women of colour are given a platform to share their ideas and have their voices heard. While it’s great to see progress towards inclusivity, it should be the norm, rather than being something so rare it still needs to be celebrated.

Pass the Mic a fantastic example of a platform that gives women of colour an opportunity to express themselves, to build skills, but importantly, to push for progress within media and beyond. Overall, attending the Pass the Mic event was an invaluable experience that reinforced the importance of equal representation in the media industry. It is crucial that we continue to support organisations like Pass the Mic and work towards creating a more inclusive society in which everyone can see themselves.

About the blog author: Anisha Yaseen is a dedicated advocate for Gender Equality and a passionate champion against gender-based violence. Her unwavering commitment to eradicating these issues has lead to impactful initiatives, fostering positive change and inspiring others to join the cause.

Critically minded? The problem of diversity in film criticism

Engender and the Equal Media and Culture Centre for Scotland have hosted student placements from the MSc in Social Research at the University of Edinburgh and the University of Strathclyde Applied Gender Studies and Research Methods course. As part of their research outputs, the students have produced a series of blogs.

In this post, Alex highlights the need for an intersectional approach to examining our cultural data and why we need more diverse voices in film criticism.

Film criticism fulfils multiple purposes. People read film reviews for suggestions on what to watch, and whether it’s worth shelling out to go to the cinema.

As a result, film reviews are also tied to a film’s financial success, its consideration for awards and whether it gets a wide release at all. Thus, critics can become “gatekeepers,” defining what counts as “good” art.

And with all that knowledge and expertise, part of a critic’s job is also “explaining culture to those who are part of it,” according to Kelsey Whipple, a journalism scholar at the University of Texas. This might mean pointing out the obscure reference to French New Wave Cinema, or it could mean helping audiences process and connect with a film’s messages and themes, especially the emotionally thorny or politically sensitive ones. But if a critic’s job is to interpret “culture,” doesn’t it stand to reason that as creative industries (slowly) diversify, “culture” is going to change? And if so, don’t critics need to keep up?

Unfortunately, progress on that front seems slow, according to a report published by the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative in 2018. In its survey of the top 100 critical reviews posted on Rotten Tomatoes in 2017, Critics Choice? found that almost 78% of its critics were men, while only 22% were women and 18% were from “underrepresented” groups. A follow-up report surveying the top 300 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes broke its figures down further, specifying that less than 4% of its critics were women of colour.

This is a problem since critics have the power to make or break a filmmaker's career, and they can help to cement a film’s place in history for its artistic merit or cultural significance. As Katie Goh puts it, “If white men are the dominant voices in criticism, then they are the gatekeepers of the industry and the tastemakers of film history.” So what happens if a critic lacks the cultural knowledge or sensitivity to appreciate films made by women or people of colour?

Rashid Shabazz is the executive director of Critically Minded, a US activist group promoting the work of critics of colour. He has commented that white men “often miss the mark,” adding that “(they) don’t have the cultural and historical reference points to assess and interpret the work (of artists of colour) in complex, honest, and nuanced ways.” This is partly due to a history of the monopolisation of cultural criticism by white men. “The absence or underrepresentation of cultural critics and writers of colour too often leaves us with a narrow worldview mostly shaped by white men and how they feel about each and every work of art and cultural production,” Shabazz concluded. In other words, the definition of “good” art is often dictated by the values of a narrow, homogenous group of people.

I was curious to see how the critics of Scotland fared in comparison. Using the Glasgow Film Festival’s Audience Award backlog as a sample, I researched reviews for the 73 films nominated between 2015-2022. I found 211 reviews, and of these, 191 reviews were written by reviewers whose genders could be identified. Superficially, the gender breakdown of reviewers seems very equitable.

This impression changed once race was factored into the equation.

While white men and white women continued to publish a fairly equal share of the reviews, less than 5% were written by women of colour and only 1% by men of colour. In fact, only one man of colour reviewer was counted in the whole sample, and he only wrote two reviews! Out of the total 211 reviews, only 11 were written by people of colour.

Clearly, it’s important to keep an intersectional lens in analysing Scottish cultural data. Without considering race and gender simultaneously here, the marginalisation of people of colour would have disappeared entirely. And, clearly, Shabazz is right; whether or not the critics are men or women, an almost entirely white perspective on film keeps our Scottish film-reviewing culture pale and stale, if not wholly male.

Engender occasionally works with students as part of their placement requirements for university or college courses - this allows students to work with Engender on specific areas of our work for women's equality. Student blogs form part of their course assessment, and they do not receive payment from Engender.

Digital abuse against feminist scholars: a case study

Engender and the Equal Media and Culture Centre for Scotland have hosted student placements from the MSc in Social Research at the University of Edinburgh and the University of Strathclyde Applied Gender Studies and Research Methods course. As part of their research outputs, the students have produced a series of blogs.

In this post, Yoke Baeyens explores a case study of the online backlash and digital abuse experienced by feminist researchers and scholars.

Online abuse is used as a silencing mechanism against women and other minoritised identities in the public (online) space.

Weaponising misogyny and dehumanisation techniques, perpetrators aim to push their targets outside the public sphere, to reinstate misogynistic, heteronormative dominance. These public displays of violence also serve to remind and threaten others who might want to defy misogynist, white supremacist, and heteronormative power structures. As Gosse et al. (2021) state, online abuse causes scholars and journalists to self-censor and choose ‘safe’ topics to discuss publicly in an attempt to protect themselves, thereby upholding the status quo. Indeed, research has shown that when women speak publicly about ‘controversial’ topics, such as feminism, this triggers online abuse. This is particularly a problem for feminist scholars who use social media to spread information on feminist research. These attacks must be recognised as part of a historical pattern of violent repercussions against those who defy patriarchal, white supremacist, capitalist dominance. Women have always been the target of abuse, and while the medium is new and everchanging, the intention is not.

Erin Dej writes about her own experience of anti-feminist backlash as a feminist scholar who carried out research on compensatory masculinity. Erin Dej and Jennifer Kilty turned the resulting abuse into a case study on the anti-feminist backlash against feminist academics. The researchers found three narrative forms of backlash, which combine to form a ‘braided thread’ of anti-feminist attacks. The threads are a collection of different arguments, views and points that can paint a wider picture when all are brought together. The authors found that these threads demonstrate continuity in anti-feminist tropes.

The first thread included the perceived dangers of feminism in the academy. This included feminist university curriculums “brainwashing” students into becoming “social justice warriors”. The abuse Dej faced also questioned her credibility and ethics as a researcher. The second thread was based on the idea that feminists are ruining gender relations. This included familiar tropes of the manhating feminist and positioned feminists as attempting to emasculate men, destroy men’s rights, and deny their power and contributions to society. It also included homophobic and transmisogynist abuse. This theme within the misogynistic abuse is linked to a masculinity crisis, something that is also researched by Jinsook Kim, who frames the abuse as a masculinising bonding experience. The third narrative thread is direct personal insults. This includes the use of gendered, violent language. This abuse aimed to sexualise Dej, evaluating her ‘worth’ as a sexual object within the male gaze. Harassment also included longstanding tropes concerning women’s ‘emotional instability’ and the effect thereof on their work and intellect. These personal insults use gendered language to dehumanise.

These three narrative threads weave together to form a highly gendered form of abuse against feminist scholars with the intent to silence them. These tropes are also highlighted by Hannah Yelin and Laura Clancy in their article exploring challenges facing feminist academics sharing work in the media and the gendered, raced intersections of ‘being visible’ in digital cultures which enable direct, public response. They focused on the anti-feminist backlash in response to an article about Meghan Markle’s feminism. While the results of their research include more reflections on patriarchal monarchy and the racialised image of Meghan Markle within the context of Brexit and Trump rhetoric, the misogynistic online abuse followed similar tired anti-feminist tropes faced by those who engage in public feminism.

Dej admits in her research that the silencing and humiliating intent behind the online abuse worked in part. She notes that she feared for her career and that writing this article felt like playing into what the perpetrators were accusing her of. Targets of online abuse often do not want to admit that harassment tactics worked on them. However, this silence around the topic plays into what the perpetrators want: silencing women and keeping the problems invisible. Dej has refused to be silenced and has added a significant contribution to the research on online abuse against feminist scholars.

Engender occasionally works with students as part of their placement requirements for university or college courses - this allows students to work with Engender on specific areas of our work for women's equality. Student blogs form part of their course assessment, and they do not receive payment from Engender.

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