Abstract
It can sometimes seem that women’s struggles for gender equality in employment is a story from the past. However, every now and then we hear disturbing facts, such as women in management positions getting lower wages than their male counterparts or vast gender disparities within particular occupations. For example, in the Spanish context, the locus of the reviewed book, in 2008, the total percentage for full professors in the university were 85.7 percent men and 14.3 percent for women (Pérez Sedeño and Kiczkowski, 2010).
In 2009 the International Year of Astronomy (AIA – 2009) was celebrated. ‘The Universe, Yours to Discover’ was the slogan of the year. The authors of the reviewed book, none of them astronomers, asked themselves the question: what is the situation of women astronomers in Spain, a country that is the fifth most prolific in terms of number of peer reviewed articles published in the field? Un Universo por Descubrir. Género y Astronomía en España is a straightforward gender mainstreaming book that wisely combines three methodological approaches: historical, qualitative and quantitative. The first part is a historical overview that takes you on a pleasurable journey into women’s history in the field: from Fatima de Madrid to Paris Pismis, the reader learns about the remarkable stories of passion, stubbornness and strength of women astronomers in history. The second part is a collection of data about men and women in the different institutions and hierarchies of research in Spain. The reader will find valuable data about gender segregation in research and university institutions in the Spanish context in astronomy, and an overview of the Spanish context in general. It is a particularly tricky field to get into as a researcher, because astronomy is not an entirely discrete academic discipline. Astronomers can, for example, come from mathematics and physics and work in quite different institutions: observatories, universities and public research institutes. The book presents comprehensive data and charts that map the gender distribution in the field, from the enrolment in undergraduate degrees, to the numbers of Spanish astronomers working elsewhere.
In the third and last part of the book, the most inspiring and disturbing, the authors give voice to astronomers, both male and female, to reflect on their lives and their careers, with special emphasis on gender relations in their field. The authors conducted in-depth interviews with well-established men and women astronomers, and put together young PhD candidates and postdoctoral academics of both genders in focus groups to discuss their problems, fears, routines, future expectations, personal situations, career ambitions, etc.
The book convincingly makes the case that indeed, ‘there is a universe to discover’: the situation of women in astronomy is by no means representative of the huge advances the discipline has made in the last two decades in Spain. New students may feel depressed after reading the book too. As a not so young woman PhD candidate myself in the social sciences, I felt my spirits fall a little after reading it. It is a book that reminds us, if we don’t get reminded every day, that women in academia face far more silent pressures than men partly because social responsibility in the reproductive and care spheres continue to fall mostly upon the shoulders of women. The book makes the case that we need to enrol men and women in astronomy courses, but that this is not sufficient. For the absence of direct discrimination against women does not mean that, over time, women will naturally occupy more positions in astronomy. We are reminded that time has already passed and the situation has scarcely improved (after pursuing a PhD in astronomy, women vanish from the picture!).
Sandra Harding and Elizabeth McGregor wrote a chapter on women in science for the UNESCO World Science Report in 1994. Back then the pressing need was to answer: Where are women in science and technology? This report first called attention to the importance of collecting gender disaggregated data in science and technology institutions as the first necessary step in identifying the ‘gender gap’ in science and technology. They also made very clear the fact that whereas the number of women students in university was far higher than the number of men, the number of female faculty and teaching staff was minuscule. They identified a set of problems and micro discriminations that triggered the loss of women in science and technology.
Sedeño and Kiczkowski show that, in this respect, nothing has really changed. There are still more women enrolled as undergraduates, and then the number drops at PhD level, and it basically free falls for postdoctoral fellows and permanent academic positions. The message is clear: the introduction of women into education is a success, yes, they outnumber men and get better marks as undergraduates, but, what happens later? Sandra Harding and Elizabeth McGregor were especially clear on that:
Efforts to ‘add women into the S&T [Science and Technology] pipeline’ have met with the reality that once inside the formal S&T system, a notable proportion of girls and women opt to leave. It is not enough with introducing women in the pipeline. In other words, ‘supply side strategies’ need to be supplemented. Simply increasing enrolments is fruitless if the pipeline continues to leak all along the way. There is a clear need to focus on changing the policies and programmes of the institutional structures where science takes place. (1994: 319)
How can we understand the current situation of women in the field? Why do so many women leave academia before defending their dissertations or immediately after?
A male astronomer interviewed by Sedeño and Kiczkowski suggests this remedy:
The problem there with the issue of women, (not only in this area but in all), is that there are all exceptional! Where there are women at all, all are true geniuses. And that’s not fair. In men, we are a sea of mediocrity, but women we have in the business are outstanding. The thing to try is to get here mediocre women. All women are exceptional, but not only in this institution, basically, in all institutes. (p. 89)
This idea, that women are performing extremely high or making extreme sacrifices, is echoed by young PhD candidates and postdoctorates of both genders. Women are reflective and self-aware about the sacrifices they may have to go through in order to survive in academia (such as postponing motherhood, leaving behind a non-supportive boyfriend) for example. Some expressed their willingness to drop their careers to have children, follow their man, or take care of a family member (‘there are other things besides work’, p. 79). In contrast, and depressingly, most of the male postdoctorates interviewed had a steady relationship and children, whereas none of the women had children, and few were in relationships. Women interviewed in the book, are, in Fox Keller’s (2001) terms ‘embodied scientists’. They are reflexive about their situations, not only as scientists, but as partners, mothers, sisters, lovers, friends, gardeners, travellers, sports women, amateur painters, etc. They do not separate their work and their personal lives as disconnected spaces: both spaces are in tension and in constant negotiation. Conversely, that tension is much less evident in the discourse of their male colleagues. In addition, men articulate an explicit separation between their professional careers and their personal lives. That distinction is impossible to find in women’s discourses. It seems that the female astronomers interviewed are ‘embodied scientists’, whereas men are ‘disembodied scientists’.
However, both genders, but especially male astronomers, believe that the problem is basically a social problem. Gender relations are changing slowly and that change will, sooner or later, show in astronomy. Within that logic, things will naturally evolve and astronomy will reflect gendered changes in society. This idea, however, reinforces the old belief that science is an activity outside society, in which there are internal aspects (those related to science) and external aspects (those concerning social change).
The book, however, leaves untouched some important debates. The authors do not address epistemological issues and the consequences of the absence of women in science. Is there a fundamentally different knowledge that women create? Do women or feminists produce better science? Do we need a science that accepts women and changes women’s lives, or do we need to change the structure of science to allow women equal positions? Science by whom? Science for whom?
This book is an urgent reminder that women’s equal incorporation into science is far from achieved and will not be achieved naturally, but require serious interventions.