Africa

Statistics around the way women are portrayed in the media reflect a dismal story.  In 1995 women made up 17% of news subjects, five years later the Global Media Monitoring Project 200, which involved teams collecting data across the world, revealed that this figure increased to only 18%.  This was despite considerable intervention, including the adoption of the Beijing Platform of Action.

Our approach to gender and ICT work involves an understanding of power relations in society. This recognition includes an awareness of the unequal power relations between women and men, North and South, rich and poor, urban and rural, connected and unconnected-in local communities, in sovereign countries, and globally.

"The power of the media to make and unmake the image of women, to hasten or retard the progress of women in society, cannot be denied or underestimated" (Ogundipe-Leslie, nd:55). However, since the 1980's, when the roles of African women have been undergoing a fundamental change to increased participation in the political, social and economic sectors of society, the tendency of the media has been to ignore or distort these significant events. In fact, in the first United Nation's document recognising the media as a "critical area of concern" for women, the media are listed as one of ten major obstacles to women's advancement" (Ziyambi,1997:1).

In highlighting this rather polemic insight, this essay attempts to go further and grapple with defining and understanding the underlying relationship between the media and gender issues, primarily in Africa. The study will include gender formation, media content and portrayal of women, employment patterns, SADC media policy on gender and, suggestions for the media on gender reporting.

At the outset, it is necessary to provide a theoretical framework for the discussion by listing and discussing the three various types of media including mainstream, alternative and folk media, in terms of their relationship to gender issues. The concepts of sex and gender, which are critical to such a research, will then be outlined.

ICTs have only recently emerged on the African continent and especially in the Francophone African region. Women are currently marginal users of ICTs and have had very little participation in formulating the policies, strategies, regulations and norms that are guiding the region.