Scientist's Gender Is Switched in Press Coverage

http://chronicle.com/article/That-Lab-Coat-Looks-Good-on/231445/

by slvv • 11 years ago

20 8 11 years ago

I wish there was a law that all articles had to have an abstract at the beginning.

JadeNB2• 11 years ago

To be fair, this is a blog post, not an article; and I think that the HN title (which is not the blog post's title) is about as succinct an abstract as you can get. (EDIT: I'm sorry, I'm wrong; it is an article on The Chronicle of Higher Education. I think that my second sentence still stands.)

JadeNB2• 11 years ago

In case anyone reflexively thinks, as I did, "probably making a mountain out of a typo molehill", the author says:

To be fair, "Kelsey" can be an androgynous name, but female pronouns were used in the original news release, so these had to have been deliberately changed. One of the news organizations that changed my gender had actually interviewed me, in person.

and, heartbreakingly:

… why does it matter? The women who set the path before I came along had to deal with much more egregious social norms and behaviors. By comparison, these "small" things hardly seem noteworthy. However, even small things add up over time to create an environment that makes it clear when you’re an outsider.

oconnor663• 11 years ago

If you do an image search of the word "scientist," you will likely get a flood of pictures of mostly white males wearing lab coats.

This appears to no longer be the case, at least for me in the US.

Klathmon• 11 years ago

Yeah for me at least half were of women

gus_massa2• 11 years ago

I agree, but most of the pictures look like stock photos or clipart. In my opinion, the first genuine photo are #16 and #19 (in my personalized order produced by Google image search, your numbers may vary). Anyway, the apparent genuine photos also have a good variation.

My complain is that most of them use white coats, so they look like Chemistry/Biology/Medical scientific. I never saw a Physics scientific with a white coat.

DanBC• 11 years ago

What should a physicist stock photo / clipart show?

That's probably a useful niche: stock photos and clip art that represent actual science.

Scientist's Gender Is Switched in Press Coverage

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