ABSTRACT
As Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) is emerging as a popular reporting framework for sustainability by capturing extra-financial disclosures, it is vital to see how gender is represented in sustainability communication. This paper undertakes to study how gender plays out in these textual genres of selected Indian companies from top constituents of Nifty 100 Enhanced ESG Index through the study of visual imagery invoked to justify the sustainability claims. Our qualitative analysis demonstrates that though women have gained more visibility and are shown to be doing away with feminine stereotypes, they still abound in tradition and modernity paradox identified by feminist theorists. While the urban women are accepted as efficient co-workers and empowered consumers, the rural women are either locked in dependency or are projected as passive dependents on corporate favors. Images of rural women either elide over their struggles or shut out the struggle through a simplistic closure of corporate interventions. Also, though urban educated women are professionally “liberated” in the outside world, within the sphere of home, they are shown holding on to the traditional values. Within these reports the definitions of woman’s beauty remain patriarchal in nature. We conclude by showing ways in which the representation of women can be reworked by embracing the tenets of equality and inclusion: building feminine strengths, upholding positive aspects about girls/women, focusing on female bonding and inclusion for all. We propose training and processes that support such progressive mindset which will be ultimately reflected in communication.
