“Miss Representation” Viewers: Welcome to the Media Justice Movement!


This post is cross-posted with www.MissRepresentation.org, in advance of the film’s debut tonight on OWN, 9pm (8c).

In Miss Representation, actress-activist Rosario Dawson talks about how important it is for women to write their own stories. This is equally important in entertainment and in journalism alike.Yet as I discuss in the film, today’s media climate is extremely toxic for women and girls, and for people of color. That’s because the main purpose of TV programming today is not to entertain, engage or inform us. Sad but true: the purpose is generate sky-high profits for the six major conglomerates (Disney, Time Warner, NewsCorp, Viacom, CBS and General Electric) that own and control the vast majority of what we’re given to watch, see, hear and play in newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, movies, billboards and video games.

As a result, women are misrepresented and marginalized as op-ed writers, front-page news sources, lead anchors, and broadcast journalism commentators… that is, when they aren’t missing entirely (as decades of research document). Scripted entertainment isn’t much better. As filmmaker Nia Vardalos wrote at WIMN’s Voices, Hollywood studios ignore data that show that audiences actually do want to support films with strong female leads, calling the success of “Sex and the City” and “Mamma Mia” “a fluke.” When Nia tried to follow up her hit “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” with a new script, studio execs pressured her to change female leads to male characters—exactly the opposite of the kind of climate Rosario Dawson is rightly calling for.


DVR Alert: TONIGHT, 10/20 @9pm(8c): “Miss Representation” brings Reality Bites Back to OWN


DVR Alert: Tune in to the award-winning documentary “Miss RepresentationTONIGHT, Oct. 20, 9pm(8c) on OWN (the Oprah Winfrey Network).

I had the honor of being an adviser on — and being interviewed in — this powerful film about women and the media. “Miss Representation” is the first mainstream film to delve into sexism in commercial media — from advertising and pop culture’s sexualization of girls, to triggering eating disorders, to media normalizing violence against women, to reality TV as anti-feminist backlash (which I discuss both in the film and Reality Bites Back), to double standards in news reporting on female politicians, to the trivialization of women who work in broadcast news, to the causal role advertising and media consolidation plays in all of this, to the need for media literacy to help youth and adults become more active, critical media consumers.

OWN will decide whether to re-air “Miss Representation” based in large part on the ratings it draws tonight. So please tune in… and ask five friends to set their DVRs as well. Tweet it, Facebook it, email people. (If for no other reason than the cognitive dissonance that results from seeing me and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice agree on something!)


Boston, MA – 04/08/11


NCMR: National Conference on Media Reform
When
Friday2011412
- All Ages
Where
NCMR: National Conference on Media Reform (map)
Boston, MA
Other Info
Conference lasts from April 8 - 10. Jennifer L. Pozner and Sofia Quintero will facilitate a hands-on media literacy workshop helping attendees deconstruct gender and race bias in reality television. More details to come.

Chicago – 04/04/11


Project Brainwash lecture
When
Monday2011412
16:30 - 4:30 - 7pm - All Ages
Where
Northeastern (map)
Chicago, IL
Other Info
Project Brainwash lecture, followed by Q&A and book signing for Reality Bites Back

Chicago, IL – 03/31/11


Project Brainwash lecture
When
Thursday2011312
- All Ages
Where
Northwestern (map)
Chicago, IL

Terra Haute, IN – 03/29/11



VIDEO: Jennifer L. Pozner on CBC News “Connect with Mark Kelley”: 25th anniversary of “The Real World”


Yesterday, I wrote that I’d be appearing on CBC News’s Connect with Mark Kelley to discuss the state of reality television on the 25th anniversary of MTV’s iconic The Real World. Today, I’m happy to share the interview with you. My discussion is part of the following six-minute video package, starting at 2:14:


DVR ALERT: Tonight (3/9), 8:45pm EST: I discuss the 25th Anniversary of “The Real World” with CBC News “Connect with Mark Kelley”


Quick hit: Tonight, to mark the premiere of the 25th season of The Real World, I’ll be on the CBC News show Connect with Mark Kelley to discuss how reality TV has morphed from one iconic (yet fringe) MTV show about strangers living together in 1992, to the landscape-altering genre it became once it traveled to network television in 2000.

Connect with Mark Kelley airs live from 8 – 9pm EST; I’m told that my segment will air at 8:45pm. Tune in live, or watch it online at http://www.cbc.ca/connect/

(And for those of you who care about such things… why, yes, that will be a big box of tissues right outside the camera’s frame! I’m

battling a nasty cold right now. Just consider me your puffy-eyed, red-nosed media analyst, at your service!)

I hope to be able to address some of the following, from the introduction to Reality Bites Back: The Troubling Truth About Guilty Pleasure TV (all footnotes available in the book; bracketed descriptions and names provided here for context):


Storrs, CT – 02/28/11


Project Brainwash lecture
When
Monday2011212
19:00 - All Ages
Where
University of Connecticut/Storrs (map)
Storrs, CT

Princeton, NJ – 12/01/10


Project Brainwash lecture
When
Wednesday20101212
19:00 - All Ages
Where
Princeton University (map)
Princeton, NJ 08544
Other Info
Project Brainwash: Why Reality TV is Bad For Women...
(...and men, people of color, the economy, love, sex, and sheer common sense!)

See description here: http://www.realitybitesbackbook.com/lectures-workshops/

WHEN: Dec. 1, 7pm
WHERE: Princeton University, Robertson 001

Sponsored by the Program for the Study of Women & Gender and organized by Melissa Harris-Perry