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Women in a men’s world?
By ella | June 9, 2005
I thought it was interesting that Lionel Shriver, who won the Orange Prize for Fiction on Tuesday for her novel about motherhood gone wrong, changed her name to Lionel from Margaret Ann aged 15 because she ‘thought men had an easier life’.
I have always written music using a male pseudonym. It was a decision I took when I started out, as women writers in popular music have traditionally been few and far between. As a modern woman (I hesitate to use the word feminist because although I am a feminist I associate myself more with the doctrine than the movement) I feel slightly ashamed that I have felt the need to write using a male pseudonym. However I know that in my heart of hearts, in doing this, my music was judged solely on its own merits irrespective of my gender. If we lived in times of true equality then I think my music would be judged solely on its own merits but regrettably the music industry is dominated by fat cat males and ‘girls’ are not given equal weighting in the writing, production and other backroom aspects of the music industry. There are, of course, exceptions. In the UK this means, among others, Cathy Dennis and Debbie Wiseman, two very successful composers. And female singer-songwriters have always had success. But the industry, both here in the UK and in the US, is dominated by men.
Other instances of gender inequality abound, whether it is professors giving students with male names higher marks than those with female names or women struggling to break the glass ceiling in business. If there is a chance to level the playing field by having a male name so that assumptions are not made about your ability before that ability has been properly assessed, is that wrong? Is it deceitful? I don’t think so. And in novel writing, composing, anonymous student marking and so on, where the person doesn’t have to be present when that ability is being assessed, it is possible to have that equality.
So I can understand why Lionel Shriver did what she did. However despite choosing a male name, I find it a little ironic that Shriver won the Orange Prize for Fiction, which is a women-only competition, writing about a traditionally female subject: motherhood.
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Categories: Feminism, In The News
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