Though not strictly related to e-publishing, an article in today’s PublishersWeekly examines why publishing is now a primarily female-dominated field and just how this affects the industry. Do women dominate the field because they typically grow up reading more than men do? Does the lower entry-level pay base deter men? Are “causes” such as these really legitimate, or are they merely self-perpetuating stereotypes? How does a lack of male perspectives affect what gets published and how it's marketed, if at all? These and other fascinating questions are considered.
-- Heather Walrath
Heather, thanks for posting this! I've read the article over a few times and have struggled in trying to form a response because something about it rubs me the wrong way. I think I finally determined it's the overall tone and framing of the issue.
ReplyDeleteThe use of the phrase "bad for business" in the first paragraph set the tone for me, despite the fact that the author was (apparently? maybe?) trying to pose an unbiased question. The choices she presents, though, are either "bad" or "doesn't matter." "Good," I guess, isn't an option.
This might be me misunderstanding the book publishing world, since my background is in journals, but I'd like to think that acquisition editors display a certain level of objectivity in choosing manuscripts, based on what the company typically publishes (like Professor Faherty keeps saying, having a clear mission statement is critical!). Perhaps I underestimate how much subjectivity is at play in a job like that. And perhaps I'm wrong in thinking that the higher-ups (who are likely more balanced in terms of male-to-female) are part of the decision process, too. Can we not trust women to make choices on behalf of their audience? And if their audience is overwhelmingly female, is it wrong to choose more works that would appeal to females, at least until audience demographics shift?
I think there's a lot that needs more attention, whether it's the problem of males lacking reading interest, or the pay gap. These issues are just thrown in here in a way that almost blames women for the consequences (If those women and their unfair pay stopped working in the industry, then men would want to work in publishing!) when instead, we should be investigating why that extreme of a gap still exists and what can be done to equalize it. Obviously, these are topics for another article, but it would be nice if the author presented them differently.
Finally, I thought the way they presented the statistics was misleading. Basing your article's thesis off the percentage of women who've been working in publishing for less than three years seems unsound. Clearly, the overall percentages are still heavily skewed in the female direction (70/30), but why wouldn't you look at that number for a better picture of publishing in its current state, rather than what it could be if all those under-3-years folks were guaranteed to stick around?
I'd be interested to see if PW runs any follow-ups to this. Thanks again for sharing!
In both companies I've worked at, it's been heavily dominated by women, and I do think it has a lot to do with money. Plus, who really considers "publishing" as a "manly" field? It's just our current way of thinking. It's interesting, though, because a lot of the vendor we have at Wolters Kluwer who are outsourced are indeed male. It might have something to do with specific cultures.
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