tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5360814020056871156.post4127211745398694996..comments2024-03-03T13:55:46.243-08:00Comments on Ambling Along the Aqueduct: US Culture vs Women & Girls doing ScienceTimmi Duchamphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00673465487533328661noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5360814020056871156.post-51906866670260818502013-10-10T07:18:55.744-07:002013-10-10T07:18:55.744-07:00Timmi, I absolutely agree about the importance of ...Timmi, I absolutely agree about the importance of changing the culture. One reason I keep coming back to Fels is because she shows so clearly that what most successful men get -- and most women don't -- is recognition. Having the right person take your work seriously at crucial moments makes all the difference in careers. Because this is done so informally, it takes an institutional shift that pays attention to it to change it. <br /><br />Where I think change on the individual level is most important is in figuring out -- as Pollack did in looking back on why she didn't go on to graduate school in physics -- that we were good enough, that it was the way things worked that put up barriers. Too many women have decided -- as Pollack did -- that they couldn't cut it when in fact they were outstanding. I think realizing this helps us both hang in there on our own individual career paths and fight for better policies for us and for others. The greatest danger of the individual approach is that those who get shunted aside by authority that ignores them (or actively discourages them) blame themselves. <br /><br />Nancy Jane Moorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01030267999537291250noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5360814020056871156.post-45732582818963362532013-10-08T14:30:20.735-07:002013-10-08T14:30:20.735-07:00What I find new & interesting in Pollack's...What I find new & interesting in Pollack's report, Nancy, is her comparison--confirming Ann Hibner Koblitz's comparison in an essay published in the CSZ's Women and Science issue-- of cultural differences & their concomitant outcomes between the US on the one hand & many other countries on the other. <br /><br />After more than 40 years of feminist struggle, it has become clear to me that there's only so much change that can be accomplished on the individual level, when the culture at large continues to be complacently contemptuous toward women. The main difference between then & now (apart from the lowering of formal barriers to entry like those I faced in 1968) is that women are inculcated with the idea that there's nothing to stop them from succeeding professionally other than they themselves. Since about 1985, for obvious reasons, feminists have shifted their efforts from changing the culture as a whole to changing women as individuals, with the hope that making them stronger & more responsible individuals will be a good-enough solution to gender issues. I took that shift as a temporary, stop-gap measure, but it seems to have become, instead, a sad dead-end. I had to laugh, reading that article, at the Yale faculty women's assumption that women students no longer suffered the usual, predictable slings & arrows of gender bias, sexual harassment, etc. Imagine being that out of touch with the conditions framing the potentials of an entire generation...Timmi Duchamphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00673465487533328661noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5360814020056871156.post-37098108386598633702013-10-06T21:53:33.784-07:002013-10-06T21:53:33.784-07:00I was very impressed by this article, too. The aut...I was very impressed by this article, too. The author is working on a book on the subject, which I'm looking forward to. But I found myself once again thinking back to Anna Fels's 2004 book <i>Necessary Dreams</i>, which pointed out the importance of recognition and encouragement. Fels was writing about all fields, not just science and math, but the principles are the same. I notice her book is now out in a Kindle edition and is still in print in paperback.Nancy Jane Moorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01030267999537291250noreply@blogger.com