Dr. Stacy Smith

Biography

Stacy L. Smith is a foremost disrupter of inequality in the entertainment industry and the recipient of the 2025 James Irvine Foundation Leadership Award. As the founder of the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative (AII), she leads a global think tank focused on studying issues of inequality in entertainment. Her groundbreaking research delves into gender, race/ethnicity, LGBTQ+ community, and mental health representation across film, television, and digital platforms. The Initiative conducts economic analyses to explore the relationship between inclusion and financial performance. Smith's work has been featured in prominent media outlets such as the New York Times and CBS Morning News. With over 100 authored chapters and articles and more than 75 studies at AII, she addresses various aspects of entertainment and regularly speaks on media inequality. Her TED Talk has garnered over 1.1 million views. Smith has testified before the U.S. Congress on entertainment inequality and is known for her idea of the inclusion rider, which gained attention at the 2018 Academy Awards. She actively promotes Latino representation in film, collaborating with notable figures such as Eva Longoria. In 2023, she launched the Proof of Concept Accelerator, supported by the Netflix Fund for Creative Equity.

Research Interests

Awards