New study finds no meaningful improvement in on-screen representation of women and racial/ethnic minorities since 2007.
Despite the success of movies like Get Out and Girls Trip this year, a new report from the Media, Diversity, & Social Change Initiative at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism finds that the race problem in Hollywood remains largely unimproved. In fact, the study suggests that the percentages of black, Hispanic, Asian, and other characters have not changed since 2007. According to the study, women and Hispanics are the most underrepresented on-screen in proportion to their percentage of the U.S. population. Women of color are particularly impacted, lacking representation in nearly half of 2016’s top 100 films. It appears that while 49 percent of movie-goers are underrepresented racial/ethnic minorities, 70.8 percent of the characters they see on screen remain white.
About the Study
The study examines the top 100 grossing movies for the years 2007-2016 (excluding 2011). A total of 900 movies and 39,788 characters were evaluated.
Here’s a snapshot of some of the findings:
- Representation of females in film has not really improved since 2007. Only 34 of the top 100 movies in 2016 depicted a female lead, which is pretty much the same as 2015. Of the 34 female leads, only 3 were underrepresented minorities, which is identical to 2015.
- Women of color are invisible in nearly half of 2016’s top 100 films. Latinas are the most invisible, lacking speaking characters in over 70 percent of these films.
- Only 3.1 percent of speaking characters in 2016’s top 100 films were Latino, and the number of films excluding Hispanic/Latino speaking characters has increased significantly.
- While the number of films portraying black characters increased 9 percent this year, the percentage of films not including a single African-American or black speaking character, increased 8 percent. 47 percent of films included no black female speaking characters.
Where my ladies at?
The study reflects that women are the most proportionally underrepresented characters on-screen. Despite being more than half of the population, only 31.4 percent of speaking characters are female. That means that there are quite literally more than twice as many men in films than women. Viewers see 2.18 men for every 1 woman, to be exact. Additionally, the study points out that the representation of women on-screen has improved by a statistically insignificant 1.5 percent since 2007.
It’s also worth noting how female characters are represented on screen. Of the female characters, more than 25 percent were depicted in sexually revealing clothing or shown nude or partially nude. This is compared to only 5.7 percent of male characters depicted in sexually revealing clothing, and 9.2 percent of male characters shown nude or partially nude.
“The epidemic of invisibility is alive and well for women of color”
When gender and race/ethnicity are cross-evaluated, the results become really startling. While only 32 of the top 100 movies featured a female lead or co-lead, only 3 of those females were underrepresented racial/ethnic minorities. Even more concerning, is that women of color were completely invisible in 47 percent of 2016’s top-grossing movies.
Regarding speaking characters, the study found that out of 2016’s top 100 movies:
- 47 had no black females;
- 66 had no Asian females; and
- 72 had no Latinas.
The study points out that only 11 of these movies lacked white female speaking characters.
Where are all the Latinx?
According to U.S. Census data, 17.8 percent of the population is Hispanic. However, the study reveals that only 3.1 percent of speaking characters in 2016 were Hispanic or Latinx. In fact, the study found that out of 100 movies in 2016, only one featured proportional representation of Latinx on screen. On the other hand, the study found that 54 of the top 100 movies featured no speaking characters that were Latinx. As mentioned above, an even larger number of films featured no Latinas. The study indicated that Latinx invisibility increased a whopping 14% since 2015.
Good news/bad news for Asians
The only positive finding reported by the study is that the number of films with no Asian speaking characters decreased from 49 in 2015 to 44 in 2016. This statistic ought to be taken with a grain of salt though, given that 2016 was far from a good year for the casting of Asian and Asian-American characters. Doctor Strange director Scott Derrickson faced backlash when he chose to cast white actress Tilda Swinton in the role of a Tibetan male. 2017 has not been much better, with the controversial casting of white actress Scarlett Johansson as a Japanese Manga character in Ghost in the Shell. The study makes it clear that with such a small percentage of Asian characters on screen, every casting decision counts and must be made intentionally.
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How to fix this
USC included a number of helpful suggestions for making meaningful improvement. For instance, if each director added five female speaking roles to their films, on-screen gender equality would be reached by 2019. USC also encourages consumers to support films featuring or directed by underrepresented minorities. A-List celebrities are also encouraged to use their star-power to promote on-screen diversity by including an equality clause in their contracts.