Beyond the Beat

The Representation of Women in Music Videos Across Genres over Four Decades

Abstract

The portrayal of gender in music videos has significant implications for societal attitudes and behavior. Women continue to be underrepresented and sexualized in music videos. Most research on the subject thus far has focused on a single music genre, which carries the inherent risk of placing the blame for encouraging gender inequality and misogyny on specific music genres. Our study uses a comprehensive automated quantitative analysis of 9,799 music videos spanning four decades and multiple genres. We used multimodal large language models (MLLMs) to examine the visibility and sexualization of women. We find that while women’s visibility has increased over time, gender inequalities persist and vary significantly across genres. In particular, women artists tend to have higher visibility and are more likely to be sexualized in their videos. In addition, genre differences play a significant role, with the results revealing that dance videos have higher levels of sexualization. These findings emphasize the problematic role of music videos in shaping gender perceptions and highlight the need for continued research and awareness-raising to promote gender equality in media representations, particularly within the dynamic landscape of the production and consumption of music videos.