Another year, another round of disappointing Oscar nominations.

Once again, the category for Best Director—officially titled the Academy Award of Merit for Directing—lacks a female nomination. In the near 100 years of the Academy Awards’ history, only five women have been nominated for Best Director, and out of those five, Kathryn Bigelow is the only winner, awarded for her 2009 film “The Hurt Locker.”

This limited showing is not for lack of female-directed movies. 2019 brought “The Farewell,” “Hustlers,” “Booksmart,” “Queen & Slim” and Best Picture nomination “Little Women” to name a few. Ranging from 82% to 98% on Rotten Tomatoes and 6.4 to 8.1 on IMDB, these films received critical and audience praise. Yet, the directors were still unmentioned in the category.

This year’s directing nominees include Quentin Tarantino, Todd Phillips, Sam Mendes, Martin Scorsese and Bong Joon-ho, who won the category. With each director’s film nominated for Best Picture, along with multiple nominations across other categories, these works are undoubtedly notable. Their scores average 87.4% on Rotten Tomatoes and 8.28 on IMDB, so as with the women’s movies, praise is certainly warranted.

However, as a viewer, I don’t need nominations and critic scores to tell me the quality of work created by these men. Still I’m left wondering what these men achieved that the handful of female directors didn’t.

The question largely falls on the academy itself.

In a 2012 study, the Los Angeles Times unveiled the lack of diversity in the academy’s demographics. At the time, it was 94% Caucasian and 77% male with the median age being 62 years old. In 2016, it was still heavily white and male, reflecting 89% and 73%, respectively.

Based on these numbers, the issues of representation move past the directing category.

The #OscarsSoWhite hashtag was created in 2015 by April Reign amidst that year’s all-white acting nominations. The next year, all the acting nominees were once again white, launching the hashtag into a new Twitter storm. This backlash resulted in the A2020 initiative that promises to double the number of women and minority academy members by 2020. A more inclusive academy leads to awareness in nominating, particularly in recognizing the work of all creators.

Some years have an abundance of nominees and winners from minority groups, and other years, only a handful are present. Having one good year is not enough to prove the Oscars are representative or inclusive. The industry itself is still in need of change.

We’ve all heard and seen instances of representation for the sake of representation. This isn’t the best approach, as harmful, inaccurate or negative depictions hurt more than help, but including women in the directing category would be more than a way to “save face.”

Quality films are being created. The directors behind those films are worthy of awards and recognition. The nominations wouldn’t be out of pity; they would actually acknowledge the work of female directors.

It makes sense to limit the number of nominees per category to focus on a few options since it is a tight race. But if the Best Picture category can be expanded to accommodate more nominees, so can other categories, such as Best Director. After 2008, about eight to 10 films were nominated each year for Best Picture, opposed to only five films before. Who’s to say the directing category can’t be expanded, especially with the respectable work being created?

At the end of the day, the Oscars and other award shows reward the highest quality work in the industry. Most of the winners are deserving, but the shows could be so much richer if all people were considered.

Minority groups will continue creating films. Only time will tell if their efforts are rewarded.

Maddie Peters can be reached at pete9542@stthomas.edu.