GENDER AND SCIENCE: Studies Across Cultures

Description

Science has been gender biased for centuries across cultural contexts. Different ideological constructions of gender through different eras have restricted women’s access to science. The twentieth century, especially its second half, witnessed certain important changes in terms of women’s status in society. Gender and Science: Studies across Cultures includes essays by leading academics and researchers from different parts of the world, who discuss gender and science in their society and explore the relevance of gender theories. The book is divided into two broad sections. The first section provides conceptual reflections on gendered science and the second section examines the gender-science relationship using examples from various cultural contexts. This unique volume tries to answer several important questions such as these: Could science become free from gender biases? Could gender and science issues go beyond race, class, colonization and social and geographical distinctions? Are gender and science relations universal as assumed by the ‘ethos of science’ or vary with the culture? The book also tries to strike a balance between analyses of the gender dimension of science itself and the role of the wider social, economic and cultural factors. This interdisciplinary volume will be an important resource for graduate students and research scholars of gender studies, social history, psychology and sociology. Those interested in gender and science as well as cross-cultural issues will also find this book useful.

Neelam Kumar is a former Scientist, NISTADS, and Professor (Retd.) AcSIR, CSIR. Her other noted work is Women and Science in India,(Ed.), Oxford University Press, 2009.

Reviews

This volume should be of interest to researchers and policy makers who seek to explain why the gender gap in the sciences continues to exist and how it is manifest in specific national and cultural contexts. – Gender and Society, 2013

Whether primarily historical, biographical, demographic, sociological, or statistical in approach, each of these essays… help us assess the types of conditions that women in science face and help us envision future pathways that may enable girls and women around the world to reach their full potential in science and technology. -Isis, 2014.