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Abstract: Jazz is notable among genres in emerging from marginalised communities to contemporary association with high social status. It is also male-dominated in terms of both consumption (audiences) and production (musicians). Using the Taking Part surveys of cultural participation in England, we investigate the gender gap in jazz and how it compares with classical and rock. We find women are less likely to attend jazz concerts, and attend less frequently, than men. We also report on a unique dataset of 983 musicians, identifying how the position of women in the jazz network differs from men. Women also appear to feature lower recording productivity, a gender difference working directly rather than mediated by instrument choice or period of birth. We argue that it is sociologically-useful to pay attention to inequalities within genres, and that findings may inform measures for debiasing. We also speculate regarding mechanisms of gender inequalities which may hold in other cultural and occupational contexts.

The Sociology Seminar Series for Hilary Term is convened by Bess Bukodi and Colin Mills For more information about this or any of the seminars in the series, please contact sociology.secretary@nuffield.ox.ac.uk.