Here are the grand totals for both newspapers for the period 17th April - 16th May 2008. See the two posts below for the individual results for the Guardian and the Observer.
First, the gender split in raw numbers:
And then in percentages:
I'm not sure what I've proved, other than that there *is* a fairly major discrepancy in the way each gender is represented on the letters page of the Guardian and the Observer.
In that sense, the hunch that I had at the beginning was correct (incidentally, I thought that this would make me feel triumphant: as it turns out, it just makes me feel a bit deflated and depressed). But I'm still no nearer to knowing why, or whether that discrepancy is the result of sexism (conscious or subconscious) or simply due to the fact that fewer women write in to the papers in question.
For those of you who are wondering why I still haven't just emailed the letters editors to ask what proportion of letter-writers are female and what proportion male, the answer is I'm hesitating to do so because I know I won't get a statistically correct answer but rather one based on gut feelings, and gut feelings tend towards over- and under-estimation. I'll send off my emails today though, and see what comes back. If nothing else, it might eliminate some of the theories put forward here.
5 comments:
Well done, P. You've seen this thing out (unlike my abortive DVC analysis). And I suspect the letters editors will be chuffed that someone cares enough to investigate, even if there's an implied criticism of their judgements.
Thanks Tim - I nearly didn't get to the end, but I felt so guilty at not finishing something I'd started that I forced myself to.
I suppose I am not quite at the end yet, though...stay tuned for the lettors editors' responses.
Even unfinished, your blog about DVC was infinitely more entertaining than this one!
Good stuff Patroclus... Will be interesting to see what the response to your email will be.
I'm interested to see the editor's response, even if it's his/her (public) perspective on the data rather than the actual data.
Your blog (or possibly some post-surgical drugs) has pushed me to muse about the nature of categories and the ways we categorize things. I've blithered about this at length on my blog, but I'm also very interested to see if the editor phrases his response with reference to some of the categories you describe in the previous postings -- is it the topic of women's letters? or just the shortage thereof? Or something we haven't thought of yet?
More questions than answers, but I'm glad you started the process.
This is so interesting, and certainly worthwhile. I am going to be really interested in any response you get.
You have scarily opened to the door for a whole range of further analysis though - the average length of letters by men and women, writing style, comedy vs. serious....
I'll shush up.
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