Gender Balance at NCMR2007

Lots of congressMEN. No congresswomen. Balance of Hollyweird stars: Danny Glover, Geena Davis, Jane Fonda. Entertainers… balanced musical acts, Rev. Al Green’s choir brought female soloists forward. Pundits however were largely men, maybe 20% female at best. FreePress personnel were balanced, but typical panels seemed to have four men and one woman… viz. Gigi Sohn and four men, Chris Nolan and three men, with Ellen Miller moderating… a visual presence, but not a participant past the initial introductions.

Among the attendees, I venture to guess that there are equal numbers of men and women present.

Update in response to Jesse’s comment below: I was simply musing, trying to recollect and post an impression. My program was tucked in my suitcase and I hadn’t thought to review my notes, which were inadequate anyway. Here’s a more objective statement.

Friday thru 1pm: The Mayor, John Nichols, Yolanda, Bill Moyers, Jesse Jackson… score 1 woman to 4 men. (Ignore power imbalances in this one…)

1:15 to 2:45 - (Creeping Deeper: Advertising and Commercialism): Diane Farsetta and three guys… aggregate score 2 women to 7 men.

3:15 to 4:45 - (Saving the Internet): Azlan White and four guys, plus Frannie Wellings as moderator… aggregate score 4 women to 11 men. Now Frannie and other female Free Press people did yeoman service, each moderating several panels. Free Press had male moderators also working hard on several panels throughout the conference. I think one rule for this game should be that we only count the hosts one time, no matter how often their faces appear.

5:15 to 6:30 - Judith Siers-Poisson moderated our regional caucus… aggregate score 5 women to 11 men

Saturday 9am - (Citizen Journalism) Ellen Miller moderated, Chris Nolan, Tim Wu, Jay Rosen, and Dan Gillmor comprised the panel… aggregate score 7 women to 14 men.

11am (Capitol Hill update) - 5 men including Ben Scott from FreePress moderating… aggregate score 5 women to 16 men. Now playing opposite this group in the same time slot was a panel on Feminists for Media Action with five women, but I didn’t go to that one so I’m not modifying the score. Anyway, at that same time Sascha Meinrath and three other guys were on a community wireless panel moderated by Dharma Dailey that I probably would have gone to if I could have spread myself around.

2:30 (An Inside Look at Media Policy) - Gigi Sohn and three male panelists moderated by Ben Scott. I’ll not count Ben twice, so the aggregate score now is 6 women to 19 men.

4:30 (The Press at War and War on the Press) - 3 women, 2 men… aggregate score 9 women to 21 men.

Sunday 9am - (Media Scholars Policy Research Review) - 1 woman, 5 men… aggregate score 10 women to 26 men.

That’s it, Jesse! If we add your 10 women and 12 men we get a 20:38 ratio, somewhat better than 1 in 3 panelists were women.