Representation of Vietnamese Women in Media

Introduction

For a long period of time, the Asian and Pacific Islander Culture and community has not been giving the female the required chance to show their potential. This is simply because that they believe that women are not able to act like men. Different reports have reported that a very limited number of Vietnamese women have been allowed to take part in the media. There have been gender stereotypes that have been against the representation of the women in the media.

Despite the fact that Vietnam is putting a lot of efforts so as to achieve gender equality, it is very clear that there have been very slight improvements because the public perceptions of women have not changed a lot (Heberle & Mark, 2009). High female literacy rates and making sure that there is equal participation in the workforce are some of the efforts that have been used by Vietnam.

Reasons for the underrepresentation of Vietnamese women in media

There are various issues that are considered to be traditionally feminine are left to the women when it comes to the media. These include family matters, childcare and also woman rights. Men on the other hand usually deal with media issues relating to foreign policy, science, and technology, politics, economics, real estate, military, and security. This is a clear indication that a large number of media issues are left to the men while a very limited percentage is left for the women to do. This means that the Vietnamese women are believed not to able to perform media tasks that require a lot of expertise (Anderson & Jaynie, 2009). The lack of visibility in the media has contributed to this situation because it has made a large number of audiences believe that women are not able to qualify for various media positions.

Even though Vietnam recognizes the levels of gender inequality, the perceptions of the public make it very difficult for the efforts of achieving gender equality to be successful. A large number of the public believe that women should primarily focus on ensuring that their families are taken care of and leave the other duties to be done by the men. This is evident because of different reports that in every group in the media; only one woman will be found to be working with two men.

The gender ratio has been varying depending on the media platform but most of the women who were lucky to participate were given the speaking roles. Considering the various categories of women representation in media in Vietnam like broadcasting, streaming and taking part in films, there is a huge underrepresentation of women with more than three-quarter of the media positions being allocated to men.

Different areas in the media have also been politicized which ends up in lowering the numbers of women representation in the media. Considering the case in Hollywood whereby casting is meant for women who are forty years and above, is a clear indication that the skills in the young ladies will not be used because even most of these chances are given to the males. Only a quarter of the members are women (Goldstone & Jack, 1998).

Additionally, the levels of female sexualization in the different media platforms also vary but in most cases, they are mostly required to be partially naked especially in broadcasting and streaming than in the films. A larger percentage of the women are required to be in sexy clothing and in other cases the level of nudity to be high and to be attractive also.

This sexualization has been troubling because it makes some women be anxious since they feel that appearing while partially naked will have a lot of negative effects to them. Body shame and objectification are also other issues that are likely to result from the issue of requiring women to scantily clad. Apart from being denied the chance of taking part in the media, this issue has been discouraging many women who wanted to work in the media. Many of them still fear that their culture does not allow them to be seen partially naked and acting against that will have a lot of negative effects to them and their lives.

Considering the situation of what happens behind the camera, large numbers of males are the directors of different scripted series and films with very few chances of being left for the women. Women a lowly represented in this case because, in every seven people, only one is a woman and the rest are men especially in the case of a media that is popular. It is only in TV and digital series that the numbers of female directors are more when compared to the cases of film directors and streaming directors.

For the screenwriting, there is no any significant change because the representation of Vietnamese women is still low with a large portion of the different positions being allocated to the males (Kurashige, Lon, 1964-Murray, & Yang, 2003). Broadcasting is the highest when it comes to giving the females a screenwriting credit whereby about 31% of the writers are women. Streaming and filming have about 25% and 10% of women writers respectively. This shows a very low level of women representation in the media.

When it comes to series creators, less than a quarter of them are women. The different platforms were represented equally. There is a clear indication that the relationship in terms of gender for the director and the character is very important because, in every story that the director was a woman, there was also more women or girls on the screen compared to the males. This means that it is believed that women can only handle only those belonging to their gender in a better way than in the cases of the opposite gender. Since the number of women directors is still low, the number of women on the screen will also remain to be low unless the number of women directors is increased

Considering the case of executive suites, there is still high cases of Vietnamese women representation in the media. For the board of directors and the executive management team, only less than 20% of the people are women. This shows that most of the decision-making processes are under the influence of the males and it is therefore difficult for them to make a decision that is in the favor of the women. When the different key responsibilities and authorities of overseeing the entire media industry are controlled by the men, women will not be easily represented unless changes are done on the media leadership (Goldstone & Jack, 1998). According to the reports, it is also clear that the representation of Vietnamese women in the media decreases rapidly as the level of power increases and that is the reason why there is a very low representation of women in most of the executive ranks.

Ethnicity is also another key factor that is leading to the low representation of the Vietnamese women in the media. There are large numbers of characters from the United States while the Asians have been underrepresented. There are high levels of invisibility because a large number of the streaming, television or cinematic stories do not show any Vietnamese woman on the screen speaking. Films, broadcasting, and streaming has a very low number of Vietnamese women (20%) who are allowed to speak in the media platform. It is the only cable that has shown some improvements in terms of representation of women from Asian origin.

For the different media platforms, the women from Asian origin are the ones who are shown in the sexualized attire, which requires them to expose their skin so that they can be attractive to the audience (Anderson & Jaynie, 2009). This is a clear indication that the women from Asian origin have not yet been recognized in the landscape of media in which a large percentage of it has been whitewashed. In terms of ethnic diversity, the media industry has been underperforming since most of the speaking characters in the films and television are mostly the white people.

The Vietnamese women have also been underrepresented on the basis of their race when it comes to choosing the directors of different media platforms. There has been less than 20% of the representation of women of Asian origin in broadcasting, films, streaming, and cables. Being underrepresented when it comes to the directors has also some implications in that it also leads to underrepresentation of the female characters from the Asian origin that are being cast on the screen in television, film and digital series. This has negative effects on the media because the talent is no longer put into consideration but it depends on the person who is appearing on the screen.

Importance of including women in media

It the number of Vietnamese women is increased when it comes to the media industry, there will be a lot of benefits to the women and people of Vietnam and the society as a whole. This will help in changing the stereotypes that the women cannot do particular duties when it comes to media and this will enable the society to allow a large number of women to take part in the different media platforms. This will also help in unveiling the different talents and abilities that are possessed by the women which have not been utilized. This will also help in empowering the women because this will provide them with an opportunity of exploring their potentials.

Increasing the levels of representation of Vietnamese women in the media will help in creating more employment opportunities and will also create chances for the girl child in Vietnam and the world at large because they can see a bright future ahead especially if they aspire to work in the different media platforms in the future (Kurashige, Lon, 1964-Murray, & Yang, 2003). Gender inequality will also be reduced if the level of representation is increased and this will help in changing the culture that does not give the girl child the necessary recognition.

This will also help in developing the society because giving everybody an equal opportunity will lead to the generation of a wide variety of ideas that can be useful in developing Vietnam and the world at large. Ensuring that the Vietnamese women are included in the different media companies will also lead to increased spread of the message that the media intents to spread. This is because more women will also be interested in viewing different films, broadcasts, and streaming in which the people of their gender have been given the opportunity of participating in these media platforms.

Solutions that can bring change

So that the number of Vietnamese women in media can increase, different approaches should be implemented so that the value of the women can be improved so that recognition of women. Different organizations must work in unity to ensure that these stereotypes are changed and that the culture starts valuing gender equality in the media. One of the strategies that can be applied is giving gender equality training in the different formal journalism institutions (Anderson & Jaynie, 2009). This will help in changing the minds of the upcoming media students. This will lead to increased levels of women representation in the future because the perceptions of the people will have changed and that women will start being considered as people who can do different activities that are being done by the men.

Regulations and guidelines relating to gender stereotypes should be incorporated into different professional books or even in the code of conduct of the various news organizations. This will help in changing how different organizations value women and also ensure that the representation of Vietnamese women in their different media platforms. The new regulations giving women various chances to be included in the media industry will give the women an opportunity of showing their different abilities and talents that will lead to the provision of more chances to the women which will end up in reducing the levels of gender imbalance in Vietnam.

The organizations concerned with women’s rights should be encouraged to be engaging the media frequently in cases where actions of gender inequality have been noticed. While reporting the cases where the women have not been given an equal opportunity in the society, the women’s rights organizations should ensure that there media coverage of the incident so that high levels of awareness can be created and the negative effects of not giving the women an equal opportunity when it comes to the media industry should be known so as to ensure that this information spreads to a wide area with a large number of audience and this can help in changing from the culture that believes that the women are not able to do most of the activities found in the different media platforms.

Different ways of recognizing and altering the stereotypical thinking should be implemented so as to ensure that how the society treats women changes and that women can be allowed to occupy some of the highest leadership positions in the media so that the decision making process involves all genders (Heberle & Mark, 2009). This will lead to an increased number of Vietnamese women representations in the media because the women leaders will make some decisions that encourage the inclusion of women in the different media platforms.

For the fight against gender biases to be effective, checks and balances should also be put in place so as to review the qualifications and the different storytelling decisions though implementing a system that requires a very careful processing. The progress of achieving gender balance should also be keenly monitored so as determine the improvements that are needed so as to achieve the objectives which have been set and also any achievements that have been realized. A list of considerations which is inclusive should be built with half of the population being women especially those from the Asian origin for the different positions in the media platforms like directors and the writers.

Conclusion

Considering the various advantages that are likely to be brought about by the inclusion of the Vietnamese women in the various media platforms, it is important that the gender biases and ethnicity should be stopped with all possible means (Goldstone & Jack, 1998). These changes will not only benefit Vietnam but the society at large will also benefit from this move and this will make the world, in general, a better place for everybody to live. Different organizations and the government should work together to ensure that the required change is achieved within the shortest time as possible.