Gender gap in Wikipedia

The gender gap in technology-related professions is a long-standing problem that still persists in our societies. Wikipedia, like the rest of the projects of the Wikimedia Foundation, also suffers: less than 13% of editors of the free encyclopedia are women.

An unfriendly editing interface, aggressiveness in the debates, a sexist and even misogynistic atmosphere, lack of free time or little social interaction in the projects, are some of the multiple factors that are identified as causes of gender inequality.

This exclusion implies direct consequences on content:

  • less coverage of women-related topics and articles,
  • lower quality of the same and presence of intrinsic biases.

May we be more than half of the world's population but we're not contributing to the collective documentation of history, is one more consequence of the invisibility of women in public life, underrepresented in the media and in other spaces that prevent us from being able to build and publish their biographies on Wikipedia based on reliable sources that prove their relevance. In Spanish Wikipedia only about 25% of the articles are or deal with women's issues.

According to research, in Spanish Wikipedia, 26.8% words in women's biographical articles refer to gender conditions or personal and family relationships (woman, wife, mother...); However, in the articles of men this circumstance only happens in a 3.8% of words.

In our editing marathons with a gender perspective: editatones we share all this data to make us more aware of the need to progressively and methodically change this situation of inequality. The objective, in any case, is to get to know each other, learn and value the contributions that we can make individually and collectively in this collaborative space.

> Analysis articles

In addition, the editors of our community have gone one step further and have created analysis articles about different realities and experiences with issues related to the gender gap in Wikipedia that contribute to the construction of a more equitable story and knowledge. The objective is to develop a space for reflection and interest for our community and for people from outside it who are interested in the issues we raise: