Behind the Scenes: Women in Television

An evening of armchair research will easily reveal that the vast majority of television programmes on British television1 are man made, even though women make up about one third of the television industry’s workforce — far more than programme credits would suggest. It is a highly competitive industry with a large number of technical and specialist occupational functions, which are glamorous, high status, well paid and overwhelmingly occupied by men. Television provides a prime example of gendered job segregation. Women may be a third of the work force but over 60 per cent of all women in television are to be found working in lower graded secretarial/clerical functions, whilst women make up only 8 per cent of senior production staff (Gallagher, 1985b, p. 15). Women in television management are virtually non-existent. Only 3 per cent of senior managers are women — that’s approximately one or two women per television company. This chapter looks at the television industry as a gendered and hierarchical form of work organisation in which men occupy most of the key positions of power. It is particularly concerned to look at how this affects women and their experiences of working in the processes of television production which are organised around the experiences and needs of men. It suggests that the organisational form and culture of television production not only excludes women, but reinforces the male experience and helps reproduce it. This has meant that the existence of formal equal opportunities since 1975 has had no significant effect in changing the pattern of job segregation in the television industry.