Share

Are women really bad at science?

accreditation

We need to talk about our daughters… and science.
“What remotely normal young woman would want to imagine herself as dowdy, socially clueless Amy rather than as stylish, bouncy, math-and-science-illiterate Penny?” 

– Eileen Pollack in the New York Times, expounding on the negative stereotypes of scientifically-minded women in “The Big Bang Theory”.

My partner graduated as an engineer from a British university. Despite this, she does not work in an engineering field, or any mathematics or science related field whatsoever. I realised recently I had not adequately thought about why this might be, and when I did, it troubled me deeply. 

I do not doubt that my partner is happy with her choices (as am I, I might not have met her if she had been an engineer by trade. She’d probably be married to some guy who wears a yellow hard hat – for shame). But as I began to consider the terribly skewed demographic of women to men in the science careers, it dawned on me that this was not a phenomenon to be ignored, particularly in a country where we constantly hear about the lack of engineers and university science majors.

You might not be surprised to learn that jobs in the sciences are primarily occupied by men. You may well be surprised at the degree to which this is an entrenched outcome of institutionalised prejudice against women, as my research has led me to understand.

Eileen Pollack (whose quote above calls for a critical look at one of my favourite shows – can I ever enjoy it as much again?) attended a public school in the US, and wasn't allowed to take physics and calculus because, as she was told by her principal, “girls never go in for science and math.”

She wrote in the New York Times in 2013 that she then endeavoured to study calculus from a book on her own, and after a torturous journey through Yale, she “graduated summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, with honours in the major, having excelled in the department’s three-term sequence in quantum mechanics and a graduate course in gravitational physics.” 
But she, too, declined to pursue physics as a career. 

“I was exhausted by all the lonely hours I spent catching up to my classmates, hiding my insecurities, struggling to do my problem sets while the boys worked in teams to finish theirs. I was tired of dressing one way to be taken seriously as a scientist while dressing another to feel feminine.

And while some of the men I wanted to date weren’t put off by my major, many of them were.
“Mostly, though, I didn’t go on in physics because not a single professor — not even the adviser who supervised my senior thesis — encouraged me to go to graduate school.” 

More recently, an infamous 2005 speech by then-President of Harvard Lawrence Summers caused an uproar when, according to the same New York Times, “the Harvard leader suggested he believed that the innate aptitude of women was a factor behind their low numbers in the sciences and engineering.” 

(In fairness, Dr Summers’ patently offensive comments weren’t limited to women. He “compared the relatively low number of women in the sciences to the numbers of Catholics in investment banking, whites in the National Basketball Association and Jews in farming,” too.)

Even eminently qualified women face exceptional prejudice at the top of their fields. Sylvia Earle, who led the first team of women to live in an underwater habitat for a study called the Tektite Program , recalled applying for the job in a chat with nationalgeographic.com. 

“The application for being a part of that didn’t even bother to say that you had to be a man…It was clear, this was for men only."

“But the head of the program for the Tektite project … was philosophical about it — more than that, he was practical,” Earle explained. “He said, ‘well, half the fish are female, I guess we could put up with a few women.'” 

And, so, perhaps least shocking of all, the plague’s affectations can be seen in the world of social media as well. In 2013, Elise Andrew shocked the interwebnets when it emerged that she was in fact the person behind the hugely popular Facebook page “I Fucking Love Science”. The page currently has over 19 million followers and fans.

But the initial reaction to this information was – in places – far from flattering towards our species.



So I am left anxiously wondering: If I ever had a daughter, and she happened to take more than a passing interest in a science field, would it be only up to us - would it be enough - as parents to encourage that? I’d like to think that a school or even her peers would not become barriers to entry, but given the stories of those who have spoken out, is this realistic? We need to talk about this. 

Follow Women24 on Twitter and like us on Facebook.

We live in a world where facts and fiction get blurred
Who we choose to trust can have a profound impact on our lives. Join thousands of devoted South Africans who look to News24 to bring them news they can trust every day. As we celebrate 25 years, become a News24 subscriber as we strive to keep you informed, inspired and empowered.
Join News24 today
heading
description
username
Show Comments ()
Editorial feedback and complaints

Contact the public editor with feedback for our journalists, complaints, queries or suggestions about articles on News24.

LEARN MORE