What the expert say II

Improving women experts visibility in media.

According to the UNESCO Institute for statistics, more than half of all scientists in Thailand are women, an imposing level of gender equality in the traditionally male dominate science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields (Misako,2018).

And yet this doesn’t seem to be the story when you pick up a newspaper or turn on the television. A 2015 UNESCO Bangkok study for, example, showed that women are more likely to be depicted as victims, family figures, and sex objects throughout Asia. A 2014 Thai PBS study, meanwhile, found that only 24 percent of experts interviewed in a month’s worth of mainstream news content were women (Misako,2018).

The UN Committee on the elimination of discrimination against Women noted last year the “persistence of stereotypical outlook about the responsibilities of gender in the family and in society” in Thai media. Among their recommendations was implementing “innovative measures targeting the media to strengthen the understanding of significant equality of women and men”

Now, in Thailand they launched such an initiative, the women make the news is an online database of female expert sources.

This action is going to increase the contributions of women in society.

References:

• Improving women's visibility in the media: Women Make the News Thailand enters new phase. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://bangkok.unesco.org/content/improving-women’s-visibility-media-women-make-news-thailand-enters-new-phase

• Figure 2f from: Irimia R, Gottschling M (2016) Taxonomic revision of Rochefortia Sw. (Ehretiaceae, Boraginales). Biodiversity Data Journal 4: E7720. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.4.e7720. (n.d.). doi:10.3897/bdj.4.e7720.figure2f

Sarraj Nabiha