Home NEWS Eye-opening roundtable hosted by Cankarjev dom on International Women’s Day

Eye-opening roundtable hosted by Cankarjev dom on International Women’s Day

Cankarjev dom hosted a roundtable titled Successful Women and Their Perception in the Media

Mar 10, 2023

cankarjev_dom_roundtable — Photo Credit: Željko Stevanić

There is no better way to celebrate International Women’s Day than by addressing pressing topics – Successful Women and Their Perception in the Media.

There is no better place to organise such an event than in Cankarjev dom, where women have always played an integral role. Every week, one of Cankarjev dom’s halls hosts performances and events by established female artists, singers, dancers, scientists and writers. Female leadership is present not only on the stage but also in the management of Cankarjev dom. Four women represent the foundations of Cankarjev dom: Uršula Cetinski, Director General, Breda Pečovnik, Congress and Commercial Programme Director, Karmen Klučar, the Technical Director and Marjeta Pečarič, the Managing Director.

Empowering women

The ONA VE Association was established in 2021 by four enthusiastic Slovenian women: Marta Kos, Emilija Stojmenova Duh, Nataša Pirc Musar and Mateja Malnar Štembal. The association connects experts from various fields and promotes their know-how to increase recognition among the public. The ONA VE Association encourages and empowers women to start actively participating in media discourse and public events, thus contributing to a greater level of women’s representation in Slovenia.

On 8 March, the ONA VE Association, together with the German and Swedish embassies in Slovenia and the EC Representation in Slovenia, organised a roundtable on the topic of Successful Women and Their Perception in the Media. The event, attended by over 200 participants, focused on numerous issues, including stereotypes of women in the media, the importance of representativeness in the media, the importance of mentoring and networking, and the differences between the public perception of successful men and women.

Enticing panel discussion

In the panel discussion, the President of the Republic of Slovenia, Nataša Pirc Musar, shared her experiences and views on this topic. In her words, women are still first evaluated based on their appearance, not what they say. Unfortunately, women still often face sexism and hate speech, as other panel speakers emphasised. The discussion was joined by Tanja Fajon, Foreign Minister of Slovenia, Milica Antić Gaber, Professor at the Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, and Nika Kovač, Director of the 8 March Institute. The event was moderated by Nataša Briški.

Margreth Lünenborg, a researcher of journalism of equality in the media and emotions in media communication at the Institute for Media and Communication Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin, kicked off the event. In her introductory speech, Margreth Lünenborg remarked that studies have shown that among managerial positions in politics, economy and science, only 17% are occupied by women. Women are best represented in politics, where 20% of leading positions are occupied by women. However, only 4% of women are in leading positions in the economy.

Discover more about female leadership at Cankarjev dom here.