Our stories have been written by men. Mostly about men. Or about women perceived through male gaze. So we end up seeing the world through one eye only. How can we reclaim the narrative? How can we foster a more balanced storytelling?

1. Why we need more female
storytellers

2. Our storytelling has been
extremely androcentric

4. Thucydides or Herodotus were among
the first historians: since 2.500 years, the
construct of history is a male product.

5. Women’s acts and experiences have
been largely unrecorded and ignored

6. We perceive historical events from a white
catholic male heterosexual perspective
• Example: Columbus day
– Genocide or discovery?
– Mistake or historical turning point?

7. Crusades: Holy war or terrorism
and slaughter?

9. In the past, our religious texts have
been written and assembled by men

10. And today men own most of our
media outlet

12. “On TV, men speak, women
listen.”

13. And other narratives are silenced
• Speaking louder
• Speaking on behalf of
others
• Occupying the space
• Interrupting the
conversation
• Not listening to others
• Making fun of the other

14. Only one Palme d’Or of Cannes has
been awarded to a woman so far

15. In France, litterary prizes are
mostly awarded to men

16. At the last BD festival in Angouleme,
no woman was even nominated

17. Triggering many reactions

31. Even our language is
androcentric
• Male is generic: mankind,
manpower, manmade…
• The masculine, by the
presence of even one male,
is the default.
• "Every student in the
classroom did his best on
the exam."
• Even greeting mixed groups

33. Stories are written by men…
mostly about men

38. Oscar’s nominated movies are
mostly directed by men and
don’t pass the Bechdel test

39. Or if women are portrayed, it is
through male gaze

44. We see the world through one
eye only

46. Stories are incomplete

47. Stereotypes are pervasive

48. Stories are biased

50. There is a contradiction between women’s
central active role in creating society and
marginality in meaning giving process
• Women are essential and central to
creating society.
• Women have made history, yet they have
been kept from knowing it.
• Women have been excluded from creating
symbol systems and theory formation.
• Women lasted 3.500 years to realize their
own subordinate position in society.

51. Your significance in history is
key for psychic well being
• The myth that women are marginal to the creation
of history and civilization has profoundly affected
the psychology of women and men.
• The denial to women of their history has
reinforced their acceptance of the ideology of
patriarchy and has undermined the individual
woman’s sense of self worth.
• Men’s version of history has become the universal
truth.
• One cannot think universal when oneself is
excluded from the generic.

52. Women are more targeted by
negative narratives
You are fat
You can’t please your partner
You are a bad mother
You are not enough
Women don’t know
how to drive
Women lie
Women change opinion
all the time
Women are emotional

53. These constant messages have a
huge impact in terms of self-esteem

54. When we see with one eye, our vision is
limited in range and devoid in depth.
• Men and women live on a stage.
• But men have written the play and
directed the show.
• Equal parts will not make women
equal if the script is still written by
men.

55. From “you are invisible” to
“you are half of the reality”

59. We need to reclaim power at
individual and collective level
• Women’s history is indispensable and
essential to the emancipation of women.
• It changes their lives.
• We need a shift of consciousness.

60. Like the one from Ptolemaic to
Copernic vision

61. We need to reclaim women’s role
in history

63. And we need more female
storytellers!

64. We need to show the world
through a woman’s lens

71. She Who Tells a Story: Women Photographers
from Iran and the Arab World

85. We need more female
painting our streets

101. Pamela Castro

106. We need more female DJs,
rappers or musicians

115. We need movies from and
about women

119. Broadcast Miss Representation
in your organization

120. You can be what you can see

121. We do it together is a nonprofit Production Company created to
finance and produce media uniquely dedicated to the
empowerment of women.

123. Reese Witherspoon Pacific
Standard production company

124. Birds Eye View « She Writes »

125. Broadcast inspiring female roles

129. Global Girl Media teaches young girls to
be citizen journalists

130. We need new media channels
featuring the other half of the
story

139. We are the XX media collective

146. We need to restore diversity
in the media

149. Shonda Rhimes:
You should get to turn on the TV
and see your tribe.

150. The first network drama with a black
woman as its lead in nearly four decades
The Shonda effect
Viola Davis , the first black
woman to win the Emmy
for Best Lead Actress in a
Drama

151. DuVernay, who made ‘‘Selma,’’ pointed out that
of the 100 top-grossing films last year, only two
were directed by women.
• She urged constant vigilance and proactive
searching within the industry:
• ‘‘We have to ask our agents about that script
by the woman screenwriter.
We have to ask, ‘Hey, are there any women
agents here that I could talk to?’
We have to ask our lawyers about women in
the office.
We have to ask, when we’re thinking about
directors or D.P.s, ‘Will women interview?’ ’’

154. Male
Authority in
Muslim
Contexts
WOMEN’S
STORIES
LIVES
Musawah is a global movement for equality and justice in the Muslim family.
Launched in 2009, it seeks to link scholarship with activism, bring fresh perspectives
on Islamic teachings and contribute constructively to the reform of Muslim family
laws and practices.
The Global Life Stories Project is a central element in Musawah’s ongoing
and multifaceted research programmes aimed at producing new egalitarian
knowledge from within Muslim legal tradition.
In Musawah (‘Equality’ in Arabic), we draw on the latest Muslim reformist thought
and feminist scholarship in Islam, and ground our claim to equality and our
arguments for reform simultaneously in Islamic and human rights frameworks. We
recognize two blind spots in approaches to gender issues in Islam and human
rights. On the one hand, many scholars of Islam are unaware of the importance
of gender as a category of thought and analysis. On the other hand, many
feminists and human rights advocates have little knowledge or appreciation
of religious categories of thought and religion-based laws, considering them
The quest for gender equality in Muslim contexts
involves reclaiming the egalitarian ethos of Islam’s
sacred texts and creating a public voice for it.
Democratizing the Production of Religious Knowledge