The Stark Disparities for Women of Color at the Academy Awards
Photo by Sung Jin Cho on Unsplash
On its website, the Oscars’ notes that its mission is to acknowledge significant achievements in film. When outlining the goals of the organization in 1927, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences aimed to create “a method to honor outstanding achievements, thus encouraging higher levels of quality in all facets of motion picture production.” Despite the Academy Awards being held annually for almost 100 years, we are still experiencing historic firsts for women of color in 2025. This raises questions for many about how comprehensive and inclusive these awards truly are.
Photo by Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images
In 1940, Hattie McDaniel made history as the first Black person to win an Academy Award for her role in Gone With the Wind. This win wasn’t without controversy, though, as Hattie portrayed the role of Mammy. Although matriarchal figures remain prevalent in black families, the characterization in Gone With the Wind upheld racial stereotypes. Nevertheless, the role still made for a historic win, and it wasn’t until 1991 that Whoopi Goldberg won for her role in Ghost. Both Hattie and Whoopi were awarded Best Supporting Actress. Their accomplishments are significant, particularly when considering the long gap between wins for Black women. It wasn’t until 2002, at the 74th Academy Awards, that Halle Berry became the first—and still the only—Black woman to win Best Actress. This calls into question why these landmark wins are so far in between.
Disparities in recognition impact women of color across all racial and ethnic backgrounds. Chloé Zhao became the first woman of color to win the Best Director Oscar for Nomadland in 2021. With this victory, she also became only the second woman in history to ever win this award. In 2023, Michelle Yeoh won Best Actress for her role in Everything Everywhere All at Once, making her the first Asian woman to do so. Michelle was notably only the second woman of color to win this award. In 2023, Lily Gladstone made history with Killers of the Flower Moon as the first Indigenous American woman to be nominated for Best Actress. Her nomination carried even greater significance, as she portrayed a character in a real-life tragedy—the massacre of Indigenous Americans during the Reign of Terror. Yalitza Aparicio also notably became the First Indigenous Mexican actress nominated for Best Supporting Actress in 2018 for her role in Roma.
These achievements mark progress, demonstrating that nominations and wins have begun to reflect more diversity. However, the issue remains—not only in how recent these milestones are but also in how rarely women of color have been recognized in subsequent years. Women of color are seen in media less, primarily as a result of lack of opportunity. Of the top 100 films of 2023, a report found that only 13 of them had women of color as the lead or co-lead. In other words, women of color cannot be represented when there is no chance to be in top films. This has been furthered by industry bias and, later, the lack of variety in voting pools.
Winning an Oscar is often considered the pinnacle of a career in the film industry. A 2025 study from USC Annenberg examines the ongoing trend of gender and racial inequality at the Academy Awards. Within this study, the statistics for women of color are particularly revealing. The report states:
“Of the 13,653 nominees at the Academy Awards since 1929… less than 2% of nominees were women of color … Of all Academy Award winners, women of color were less than 2%. There were a total of 1,369 individual women nominees over the last 97 years, compared to 5,045 individual men … The majority of women of color earned only one nomination–87% of women of color received a single Oscar nomination in their careers.”
To paraphrase, women of color continue to make up a noticeably small portion of Academy Award winners. Even after being nominated once, many women of color are not recognized beyond that first nomination. This is how we still are achieving such immense firsts as each Oscars’ ceremony is held.
The lack of women of color being represented as Oscar winners is known to the Academy. On its website are clearly detailed Representation and Inclusion Standards. Best Picture is the biggest accolade of each Oscars’ ceremony and is signified as the hallmark movie of the awarded year. To be nominated for Best Picture, films now must meet at least two of the four standards outlined by the Academy. These terms cover pre- and post-production efforts as well as the stories shown in the nominated picture. Women of color fall under the umbrella of underrepresented groups--a standard that is one of the mandatory attributes for Best Picture nominees. Implementing measures like this combats the long-standing bias of the industry.
While these new standards signal a step toward greater inclusivity, they only address part of a larger issue. As outlined by the Los Angeles Times, the entire awards sphere often fails to be representative. This lack of inclusivity is frequently called out by audiences who follow the awards season. While the Academy has implemented measures to foster change, these efforts alone are insufficient in addressing the broader systemic inequities that persist within the film industry. Do you believe these new standards are enough to create lasting change in the film industry? What additional steps do you think should be taken to ensure true inclusivity in awards recognition and beyond?
