Tag: gender sensitization

By A Correspondent

 

The International Advertising Association, India Chapter, recently organized a one-day sensitization seminar in Mumbai. The initiative, to stop Violence on Women (VoW), saw the coming together of advertising heads, advocacy groups and film and television personalities.

 

 

Srinivasan Swamy, President IAA, said, “We are delighted to have been able to bring together people from television, feature film and advertising. The people who are content creators hopefully have been sensitized in the way they think about portraying women in various forms of content. I do believe the seminar went well and overall it has been a satisfying day.”

 

 

 

Monica Tata, Secretary, IAA, who also moderated the discussions, said, “IAAs initiative has been a resounding success. It was put together with an objective of highlighting the need of gender sensitivity across media platforms be it advertising television and films. I think we have managed to make a great start. I hope we are able to continue with the same fervour in the months to come.”

 

 

Professor Anjali Monteiro, Dean, School of Media and Cultural Studies, TISS, said, “Violence against women is a matter of the exercise of patriarchal power. We need to affirm the rights of women to dignity, to access public space and to be agents of their own making.” Anuja Gulati, State Programme Officer, United Nations Population Fund, said that education and skills would help empower women and bring them into leadership roles, leading to gender equality.

 

Very often, communicators consciously or unconsciously end up creating content that reinforces gender stereotypes. On the other hand, they seem to somehow think there is no “other” way certain communication can be crafted that not only does away with the issues we are often faulted with, but also can have a positive effect on gender issues while promoting the salience of our brands and services. This seminar sought to address gender nuances in communication from different perspectives.

 

Dr A L Sharada, Programme Director, Population First, said, “It is really encouraging to see the response of the advertising fraternity to the issue of projection of women in advertisements. Often communication is influenced by the internalized gender issues and perceptions. If we have more opportunities to dialogue and discuss the message, we would be able to make advertising more gender sensitive. I believe VoW is a very positive step in this direction.”

 

 

 

Advocating that content in media and advertising does have an impact on people’s view on women, Sangeetha Narasimhan, Executive Creative Director, R K Swamy BBDO, opined, “Content creators need to deal with the subject of women at all times with affection in the heart and put aside lust. Only then will we begin seeing some degree of positive movement in attitudes to women.” Supporting this thought, K V Sridhar, National Creative Director, Leo Burnett, said, “Ignorance is the worst enemy. The advertising community needs to be more sensitive; can’t afford to be damaging to society.”

 

 

Josy Paul, Chairman & National Creative Director, BBDO India, in his “confession speech” said, “I am evolving in my effort to be more sensitive. I am trying to create a new reality, where brands evolve with deeper sensitivity, where equality and inclusion are part of greater growth and a better world.”

 

 

 

 

Sonal Dabral, Chairman & Chief Creative Officer, DDB Mudra, said, “The only way we in the media industry can become more responsible and sensitive towards gender portrayal issues is by stopping, reflecting and acting with conscience. For this reason VoW is a wonderful effort and it has been a privilege being a part of this initiative.” Geeta Rao, Creative Director, Geeta’s List, was of the view that communication is critical and gender sensitization is imperative in advertising, and as a content creator one needs to find ways to break stereotypes in an engaging way.

 

 

Rupal Tyagi, lead protagonist of Zee TV Sapne Suhane Ladakpan Ke, said, “I am glad that the programming content is changing and this is being accepted by the people.” Actress and host Mandira Bedi said, “This is a very engaging and interesting discussion. I am very glad that this initiative has been taken and I feel privileged to be part of it.”

 

By A Correspondent

 

Srinivasan K Swamy President of the India Chapter of International Advertising Association (IAA) announced the ‘IAA Gender Sensitization Drive’, which seeks to fundamentally change the deep-rooted bias against women. The drive, termed the ‘VOW’ or ‘Violence on Women’, involves industry members “taking a vow to get rid of this scourge in our society”.

 

The initiative consists of two segments.

 

 

1 Gender sensitization seminars for content creators

The first part of the drive would be to hold a series of seminars across five cities, Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Pune, to sensitize content writers in film and TV, story writers in print media and in advertising, to guard against typifying women and on other gender nuances, and create focused awareness about the right way to project women across media. The seminars are to be addressed by a galaxy of experts in the field and also leading lights of the communications industry. The first one is already scheduled in Mumbai on February 16 which the IAA hopes will be inaugurated by Union Minister of Women and Child Development Krishna Tirath.

 

Kaushik Roy, Chairman, IAA Public Service Committee, said, “There has been four-fold increase in ad revenues. Advertising remains a buoyant sector despite a flat growth year. There has been 144 percent growth in C&S homes and time spent on advertisements has risen to 96 mins/day according to IRS. Now, this shows what impact advertising can or does have on society. Today many ads tell what women should wear or look like. The personal category, cosmetic, beauty and hair etc have 23,000 spots per day. It is thus necessary to sensitize advertisers and content creators about how to project women.”

 

2 Multimedia advertising campaign against ‘eve-teasing’

The second initiative is a national advertising campaign that will use the creative resources of the communications industry and the strength of media linkages to address behavioural patterns in a manner that would benefit women. ‘Eve-teasing’ has been identified as the critical issue that needs to be addressed. Mr Swamy said, “Eve-teasing is seen as the mother of most evils affecting women. Today’s eve teaser is tomorrow’s molester, and could be a future rapist. It is necessary to nip this in the bud.” He further added, “Research and experience of experts in the field like UNFPA and leading NGOs like Laadli have also suggested this subject as the critical one to address.”

 

A national contest will be run inviting entries from creative people all over the country on how to tackle this issue through effective communication. The entries for this contest will be judged by the best creative minds in the communications industry, and a jury consisting of leaders from a cross-section of society and NGOs will then select the winning campaign from the shortlist. The IAA will fund the production of this winning entry, and will use its strong media linkages to run a high-decibel and high-power campaign on all newspapers and TV channels across the country. The call for entries should begin in 10 days.

 

Mr Roy said, “You will realize that in a period of about three months we will have a concentrated burst of positive attention on the importance of women’s issues. We believe that such an initiative conducted by the entire communications industry led by the IAA will have a very salutary effect on the burning issues confronting women today.”

 

Pradeep Guha, IAA Regional Director (Asia Pacific), said, “This is yet another instance of the IAA taking the lead and showing how the power of communications can be used for a good cause. This will go a long way in sensitizing people on a very important issue.”

 

Mr Swamy told MxM India, “Even at our agency (RK Swamy BBDO) we are cautious that our ads do not typify women. Clients should also be aware that resorting to such things will not boost sales.”