What About the (cis-, hetero, abled, middle-class, white) Men?: Gender inequality data, the contemporary British Film Industry, and the rhetoric of inclusion (original) (raw)

2019

Abstract

This article argues that (cis-, hetero, abled, middle-class, white) men – as a group and as an identity category – are the structuring absence of inequality discourse and, as a consequence, it is ‘diverse’ persons who bear both the burden of and any hope for changing the film industry. By ‘rereading’ gender inequality data, diversity initiatives and inclusion rhetoric, this article shows the ways they elide men’s domination of the film industry and perversely reinforce it as the norm. Articulating how data on gender representation behind the camera can both illuminate inequality and can be used to obfuscate it, the article looks closely at selected reports to see what they do and do not tell us about gender inequality and the unequal presence of men in the industry. As the dominating demographic of the filmmaking workforce, the white middle class male is also the structuring absence of inclusion rhetoric which maintains the status quo of inequality in the film industry by interpella...

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