Sexism and Female Playwrights

Today's New York Times describes a fascinating trio of studies -- by a clearly brilliant undergraduate named Emily Glassberg Sands (her research is a lot better than most doctoral dissertations) -- that reveals some sexism against female playwrights. Check out the article Rethinking Gender Bias in the Theater. The first study shows that the main reason that fewer plays written by women are produced is because they write fewer plays than men.  The third study shows that plays that do get produced that are written by women make more money than those written by men -- on average, they were 18% more profitable -- the implication being that standards are higher for female than male playwrights.  But the second study is really fascinating, as it revealed clear sexism -- by WOMEN, but not men.  I quote the article:

'For the second study, Ms. Sands sent identical scripts to artistic directors and literary managers around the country. The only difference was that half named a man as the writer (for example, Michael Walker), while half named a woman (i.e., Mary Walker). It turned out that Mary’s scripts received significantly worse ratings in terms of quality, economic prospects and audience response than Michael’s. The biggest surprise? “These results are driven exclusively by the responses of female artistic directors and literary managers,” Ms. Sands said.'

If both men and women were biased against women, as there are numerous studies that show that negative stereotypes against women, minorities, and are often held just as strongly by members of those groups as outsiders -- notably by John Jost at NYU.  I also want to emphasize that plenty of other research documents gender bias by men against women. Just look at the top management teams and boards of Fortune 500 firms -- that is mostly a story of men bringing in people who look and act like their favorite person on the planet: Themselves! Or as Harvard's Rosabeth Moss Kanter called this process, "Homosocial Reproduction."

Nonetheless, this is pretty compelling evidence of unabashed sexism by women against themselves? Do you believe this is true in other settings?  If so, why would this happen?  

P.S. You can find many of John' Jost's articles at his website, where he offers free downloads. And you might also check out his most controversial  research on "Why are conservatives happier than liberals?"

 

Comments

[Vickie Pynchon]

oops; meant to say "instead of pretending that institutional and sub-conscious racism and sexism do NOT exist" . . . .

[Vickie Pynchon]

Not at all surprising to me - a woman professional who was deeply engaged in the second-wave feminist movement of the early 1970's. We, too, were raised in an environment in which the denigration of women was pervasive in all sectors. This is what 1970's "consciousness raising" was all about -- to help us free ourselves (first) of the negative self-images we haplessly incorporated as our birth-wrong. Am I completely free of negative views of women? Of course not. I have not and do not, for instance, think of myself as a "woman" lawyer, but only as a "lawyer." I think the same of my colleagues who are lawyers (who happen also to be women). Those "women lawyers" I do NOT know, however, rarely get the benefit of my "raised consciousness." I still have a knee-jerk tendency to prefer men. If more of us admitted this instead of pretending that institutional and sub-conscious racism and sexism exists, we might rid ourselves of its pernicious effect more quickly.

[Kirsten Olson]

Hey Bob, I was just sent to your site by our mutual friend Rick Hamrick. Thanks Rick. I also read the NYT piece and, as a long-time feminist and still struggling with gender oppression, both external and internal, of course this is true in other settings. You are familiar with the idea of "internalized racism" and internalized sexism is just as powerful. In my own life I have been taught to be stiller, take up less space, not to have as much or as powerful a voice as men, and to focus on managing the immense (white) male ego. Old habits are hard to break, even when an abundance of sociological and experiential evidence points to the destructiveness of them. I actually considered publishing my own work using initials, so that my gender would not be revealed.

I look forward to your blog.