This setting refers to the industries and organisations that deliver media in all its forms — print, television, radio, online and social media.
It also includes community networks and professional organisations across the creative industries, including visual and performing arts, film and literature.
Why this setting?
The media can address widespread condoning of violence against women by reporting accurately, safely and respectfully. The media can also address gender inequality, gender stereotypes and disrespect towards women through their content and in their workplaces.
The arts also offer opportunities to address the drivers of violence against women and promote equal and respectful relationships. This includes considering the way men and women, relationships and violence are represented creatively, as well as challenging norms that prevent women’s full and equal participation in creative industries, such as women’s under-representation and unequal pay.
Key opportunities
- Evidence-based media reporting on violence against women and their children can help readers, listeners and viewers understand how widespread it is, who is affected, what drives it and how it can be prevented.
- Equal numbers of women and men in the media, including as subjects and sources, can play a role in addressing gender inequality in public and private life.
- Positive media representations of women and men can help to disrupt harmful gender stereotypes.
- Respectful media representations of women, including of women’s bodies and sexuality, can help to challenge disrespect towards women in the community.
- Creatively exploring violence against women and gender inequality through the arts can assist people to understand and question their own values and beliefs.
Things you can do
- When reporting on violence against women, use best practice approaches, including leaving out details that might identify survivors, keeping the perpetrator ‘in view’, using statistics to demonstrate the prevalence and to contextualise the story and highlighting options for support to the reader.
- Seek equal numbers of male and female sources and subjects in news stories.
- Avoid gender-stereotypical representations of women and men in journalism and advertising, such as the ‘femme fatale’, the ‘super mum’, or the ‘nasty corporate climber’, for women, or the ‘strong, silent type’, the ‘jock’ or the ‘big shot’, for men.
- Use a community-based approach to engage with local communities in the planning, development and delivery of arts initiatives.
- Provide female artists and performers with equal opportunities to showcase their work.
Resources for journalists and the media
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A website for journalists, students, and media teaching professionalsA website for supporting the media to use its influence to change the culture and attitudes that drive violence against women.
Website
Guidelines for reporting violence against womenGuidelines from Our Watch that provide information and tips to support media organisations across Australia to report on violence against women.
Website
A tip sheet about reporting on violence against womenThis tip sheet fro Our Watch provides an overview of the national guidelines for reporting on violence against women.
Website
10 reporting tips for sports journalistsTen tips from Our Watch for sports journalists wanting to improve their reporting on men’s violence against women, and the attitudes and beliefs that reinforce that violence.
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A research paper about how the Australian media portray violence against womenThis research paper from ANROWS reviews the evidence on the way news and information media portrays violence against women in Australia.
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A report about the representation of women in Australian news mediaThis report from the Women's Leadership Institute Australia reviews the representation of women in Australia’s 15 most influential news sites.
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A literature review about gender portrayals in advertisingThis paper from Women's Health Victoria provides an overview of literature currently published on gender portrayals in advertising, and the impacts on women’s health and wellbeing, gender inequality and attitudes and behaviours that support violence against women.
Resources about prevention and gender projects in the arts
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A prevention program that engages young womenProject O’s primary prevention approach engages young women, increases their sense of agency, and skills them up to deliver events in their own communities that change attitudes and de-normalise violence.
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A report that documents gender inequity in the art worldThis report reveals the imbalance of power in the Australian art world, by counting artists who exhibited in gallery exhibitions, art prizes, biennales and at art fairs throughout 2018, artists who received Australia Council for the Arts funding in 2018 and staff and board members of art organisations.