Why Aren't You Reading This?
thusspakezuska | February 12, 2007Welcome to the first day of our course on "Feminist Theory and the Joy of Science". This post will be a presentation of the summaries for each of this week's assigned readings. If you were not able to do the readings or couldn't get access to the books, I hope this post will give you a good flavor of what the week's readings were all about.
You can reference the course syllabus for more details about the readings in the whole course and the course structure. Here's the initial post about the course. And here are some guidelines about how I'll post on readings and what we should strive…
thusspakezuska | February 6, 2007I like to scan the New Scholarly Books section of the Chronicle of Higher Education; every so often, something interesting in History of Science or Women's Studies pops up. Recently I saw a little blurb under history of science that read
Science in Latin America: A History, edited by Juan José Saldaña...Translation of writings by Latin American historians on the role of science in the region's societies since the colonial era.
That piqued my interest so I poked around on the web. You can order the book on Amazon. The summary below is from this site, where you'll also find the table of…
thusspakezuska | February 2, 2007Another AWIS Washington Wire in my inbox today. Here are a few tidbits I thought looked especially interesting:
Why Aren't More Women in Science? Top Researchers Debate the Evidence
This 248-page book is a collection of 15 essays by experts on gender differences in ability. They consider the question of why more women are not pursuing careers in science, engineering and math, considering innate differences, societal discouragements, differences in aspirations and other key factors. This book should challenge readers' emotional and political biases through empirical science.
This looks…
thusspakezuska | January 31, 2007Kristin wrote, in a comment:
Hey, although a search for blogs by Hispanic scientists is coming up empty, it looks like there's a new anthology by female Hispanic scientists and engineers! But you can't find it in the online bookstores. Looks like if you want a copy, you have to email NCantu AT malcs DOT net. I think we should give them a boost at getting the word out, don't you?
And she gave us this website to check out.
Here's a press release about one of the contributors to the book.
Growing up in rural Los Angeles County in the 1960s, Cal State Northridge biology professor…
thusspakezuska | January 31, 2007Mollishka writes to ask plaintively:
"Feminist theory of science"?! Other than a nice set of buzzwords, what does that even mean??
So I thought, why not go ahead and launch the Basic Concepts idea now?
On the super-secret Scienceblogs back channel, we have been discussing the idea of each doing a series of "Basic Concepts" posts on our blogs; some of my SciBlings are already doing them. You know, choose a few fundamental concepts or terms in your field, write a post describing/defining/delineating their use, label it Basic Concepts, and voila! A series is born. We thought that in…
thusspakezuska | January 29, 2007See Bill Hooker's comment about finding books for the course here.
Bill's comment got held up a day or so in junk comments because of all the links in it. Sorry, Bill! But this would be helpful for anyone trying to find/buy the books.
thusspakezuska | January 29, 2007Thanks for all your initial interest and inquiries about the course. I thought maybe I'd better do a "going over the syllabus and answering some questions" post as a result. So here it is!
Books: The books needed for the course are posted on the syllabus. PLEASE NOTE THIS ADDITION TO WEEK 1 READING: Beyond Bias and Barriers:Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering, NSF Report, Summary, pp. 1-10 (available free to read online; must pay to download).
I know the books are expensive, so not everybody can afford to buy them. If you have access to a university…
thusspakezuska | January 26, 2007I promised my friend Bill Hooker at the Science Blogging Conference that I would attempt to conduct a course of sorts on the blog. What I mean is that I am actually going to be teaching myself the course and discussing it on the blog; you are all invited to follow along if you like, or just listen in on my discussion of course material if you like.
The course syllabus is one I designed for a course called Feminist Theory and the Joy of Science. I never got to teach this course so I'm pleased to now enroll myself as a student. Hopefully I will complete the assigned readings on time. I…
thusspakezuska | January 23, 2007At the Science Blogging Conference, Bora urged us to visit the conference wiki and "click on the logos of our donors to show them interest in their sites". Because it was Bora who asked me to do so, and because I want our donors to come back next year and support us in this endeavor again, I obediently went to the conference wiki and started clicking on donor logos.
And what a lot of fun I have been having! Who knows when I might have discovered the Endeavors site without the conference wiki donors page, with this nifity article on Cultivating New Scientists.
Eleven years ago, Tomeiko…
thusspakezuska | January 22, 2007Just a short note to let you all know I've added a few blogs to the blogroll.
I thank Dr. Free-Ride for introducing me to A Natural Scientist. Do read this post of hers.
I had such a great time at the 2007 North Carolina Science Blogging Conference talking with Lab Cat , who has a post on the Teaching Science session and on the Illustrating Your Blog session. Yay! Lab Cat lives near me! Thanks for toting me all over Chapel Hill in your rental car, Lab Cat! I also had such a nifty time with Eva who writes Easternblot. I believe Eva will be writing about the conference for Inkling, so…
thusspakezuska | January 17, 2007Yes, the 30th Carnival of Feminists is up at Girlistic's blog The Feminist Pulse.
Girlistic is the ultimate feminist resource, where all things women-centered can be found within a few clicks. Providing education and entertainment, pop and politics, culture and community, resources and shopping, Girlistic is the first place to visit for women-centered information.
I like the "Featured Feminist" bit on Girlistic. Also check out the link of the week. Right now it's about women's speeches, and you may be surprised what you read about them on Girlistic.
I found this excellent post by Lee…
thusspakezuska | January 16, 2007How do you effectively encourage young girls to stick with their math, science, and computer studies in high school? How do you effectively encourage them to consider careers in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics? There's no one perfect approach; you need a full toolkit that allows you to mend all the malfunctions and rip down all the roadblocks that gender roles, peer pressures, familial or societal expectations, and poor or misguided teachers can throw at a girl.
The editors of and contributors to She's Such A Geek! thought one good tool to have in the arsenal would be an…
thusspakezuska | December 20, 2006The 29th Carnival of Feminists is up at The Imponderabilia of Actual Life, and here's one of the categories:
Sexism:
In which we look at examples of sexism from all over the world - sometimes blatant, occasionally subtle, often insidious. Some key words for posts in this section: stereotypes, gender bias, toys, pretty, and porn.
Yours truly has been included in this section for my recent post on Stereotypes and Subtext. Fellow Scienceblogger Tara at Aetiology is also in there for this post. In fact, there's a whole bunch of good stuff on gender and science that you'll enjoy.
I…
thusspakezuska | December 19, 2006If you enjoy reading Inky Circus, then you are probably going to enjoy the latest endeavor from the women who bring you that blog. That is, Inkling Magazine - subtitled, "On the Hunch That Science Rocks!" I particular like this Letter From Science Camp, in which Mike Gretes bares his soul about his love of crystallography.
Unbelievers will cry, but isn't science supposed to be the opposite of religion? O my people, truly I tell you, no, not at all. Here we are awake and surrounded by the Faithful for days, nay, weeks on end. Awake! We listen to the Good Word in lectures and lo, learn the…
thusspakezuska | November 20, 2006Joanna Russ wrote a wonderful book in 1983 called How to Suppress Women's Writing. (You can purchase it on the internet here or at your local bookseller or at amazon.) Sadly, you could read that book today and apply its insights directly to science and engineering.
So, with an acknowledgement to Joanna Russ:
She didn't do science. (But if it's clear she did the deed...)
She did science, but she shouldn't have. (It's science with a political agenda, it's actually masculine thinking.)
She did science, but look what she researched. (Technology of household equipment, domestic…
thusspakezuska | November 7, 2006Back on October 6, the Chronicle of Higher Education published a column titled The X-Gals Alliance and I missed the chance to blog about it at that time. The second in the ongoing series of columns from these fabulous women is now out, Balance It Out.
From the original column:
"We" are the X-Gals, a group of nine female biologists who began meeting weekly over a few beers in 2000, as several of us wrote up our dissertations. (Our name is a double-pun on the X-Men superheroes and on X-Gal, a laboratory chemical sometimes used in biology.)
Back then, we read one another's dissertation…
thusspakezuska | November 2, 2006Regular reader and blogger Michael Anes wrote to tell me:
I haven't heard any Scienceblogging on the gender equity report issued this morning and profiled on the Chronicle? Did you check it out?...My post and challenge is here -- I'd be interested in your take on the issue and the action I suggest!
(For modesty's sake I removed the line where Michael told me how great I am.)
Michael is referring to the new report issued by the AAUP, AAUP Faculty Gender Equity Indicators 2006, and discussed in the Chronicle of Higher Education. The report contains, as you might expect, dismal news for women…
thusspakezuska | November 2, 2006Ask a Science Blogger asks:
UPDATE:
THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE THE OCT. 27TH ASK A SCIENCE BLOGGER ANSWER
What's the most underfunded scientific field that shouldn't be underfunded?...
I can't presume to know the definitive answer. But I can give you one answer: a field that's not even on the radar screen for nearly everyone. We all know women routinely go to see their gynecologist, and women's reproductive health is an important issue. What's the equivalent for men? Do you hear of men routinely going to see their andrologist? The closest thing they have is a urologist, and that's just not…
thusspakezuska | October 30, 2006So I'm at the Frontiers in Education conference, and there's so much good stuff going on my brain is on overload. Plus, there are other people here who call themselves feminist engineers! It was worth the price of admission just to be in their company. And there are men who are giving papers talking about gender! White male engineers talking about race! Where has this conference been all my life?!?!?! Seriously, I can't believe I never went to this conference before. It totally rocks.
Also I met Bill Scher, blogger at Liberal Oasis, and author of Wait! Don't Move to Canada! A Stay…
thusspakezuska | October 24, 2006I'm reading two books at the moment (in addition to the five or so others I've started and gotten halfway through and not finished...well, they'll always be waiting for me to come back...someday...). The first is Sisters in Science: Conversations With Black Women Scientists on Race, Gender, and Their Passion for Science, by Diann Jordan, Purdue University Press.
The second is Exposing Men: The Science and Politics of Male Reproduction by Cynthia R. Daniels, Oxford University Press.
Just from the introductions, both books promise an exceptionally good read. I promise you a review of…