News Archive

April 02, 2013

Geena Davis talks about gender imbalance in films

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal’s Rebecca Blumenstein in reference to the “Unlocking the Full Potential of Women in the U.S. Economy” report, Geena Davis talks about the perception of women as seen in the media and about what has and has not changed in the past sixty years during The Wall Street Journal’s Task Force for Women in the Economy. Watch the Interview or Read More…

March 04, 2013

Evening with Geena Davis at Scripps College Performing

Geena Davis, an advocate and Academy Award-winning actor, will discuss gender equality in the modern media.Read More…

December 06, 2012

Google Grants $1.2M to Help Analyze Female Roles in TV, Film

Much like Madonna teamed up with Geena Davis in A League of Their Own, Google is joining forces with the movie star — and her nonprofit organization devoted to improving the images of women that young people see in films and TV shows. As part of its Global Impact Awards, the search giant has given a $1.2 million grant to the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media for the development of technology to help analyze female portrayals in children’s media, an area where an earlier report by the Institute had indicated significant gender inequality. Read More…

November 27, 2012

Smash Stereotypes in Kids’ TV and Movies

Among her many credits, Geena Davis has played a professional baseball player, president, and housewife-turned-outlaw, Thelma. Her portrayals include steely-spined women who speak their minds. Yet when Davis became a mother and sat down with her toddler daughter, who is now ten, she noticed women were conspicuously absent. “Especially in G-rated movies, it seemed that there were far fewer female characters [compared] to male characters,” Davis told GOOD. She began asking other people if they’d noticed the imbalance and “most people either didn’t notice, or said, ‘No, no, no. That’s not true anymore. That’s all been fixed.’” Read More…

October 17, 2012

Geena Davis calls attention to lack of women in Hollywood

Geena Davis, an Academy Award-winning actress known for roles in films including “Thelma and Louise,” spoke to a crowd of about 200 people last night on gender disparity in the media. The Institute for Women’s Leadership hosted the lecture to further communicate the goal of advancing women’s leadership in fields such as politics, the arts and the general workforce, said Alison R. Bernstein, director of the IWL. Davis, who in 2004 founded the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media to change the way females are portrayed in feature films, said she shares the same vision as the IWL, and hopes to educate the public on the obvious gender disparity found in Hollywood. Read More…

October 17, 2012

Geena Davis commits to Rutgers’ advisory board on women and media

Geena Davis has joined forces with the newly-created Institute for Women’s Leadership Women & Media initiative at Rutgers. She delivered the 2012 Susan and Michael J. Angelides Lecture on October 17, 2012 in New Brunswick. Davis spent the day on campus attending classes and meeting with faculty, administrators and scholars in women’s studies and leadership. She spoke to NJ.com about her own Geena Davis Institute on Gender and Media and her investment of energy in the Women & Media advisory board. Read More…

October 15, 2012

27th Annual Dallas Women’s Foundation Luncheon featuring Geena Davis

Geena Davis will explore gender equality and the portrayal of women and girls in the media at the 27th annual Dallas Women’s Foundation Luncheon on Wednesday, Nov. 7, 2012. Read More…

October 12, 2012

Geena Davis lends support to Asia-Pacific broadcasters’ efforts on new media

Geena Davis discusses choosing powerful female roles, the effect of media on women and getting young girls interested in careers in new media in this video interview from Seoul. Davis, who is an International Telecommunication Union special envoy, visited South Korea to speak at the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union’s General Assembly and help support its new “Women with the Wave” initiative. Watch the Video…

October 11, 2012

U.S. movie star Geena Davis calls for gender balance in media

Geena Davis, an Academy Award winning Hollywood actress and an advocate for women and girls, said Thursday she will continue to strive to promote equal gender depiction in the media. As the head of the non-profit Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, the 56-year-old actress visited Seoul to attend the 49th ABU General Assembly, an annual meeting hosted by the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU). Read More…

October 02, 2012

Geena Davis joins Cardinal Health, State Auto CEOs to talk about women in leadership

Could cartoons be shaping the future careers of our daughters? Actor Geena Davis (she questions the need for the word “actress”) raised the question Monday at an event kicking off of Columbus Partnership’s “Widen the Circle” initiative to increase the number of women in Central Ohio business leadership. She founded the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media in 2004 to finance research on how women are portrayed in popular culture. Read More…

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