I've started reading Crossing Boundaries, Building Bridges: Comparing the History of Women Engineers 1870s - 1990s. (ed. Annie Canel, Ruth Oldenziel, & Karin Zachmann, Harwood Academic Publishers, 2000) Here's how the book opens, with this in the foreword by Ruth Schwartz Cowan:
A few years ago my husband and I spoke to a literary agent about a book we were planning to write, based on interviews with women engineers. This particular agent specialized in feminist books, so we thought she might be interested in our book project. She wasn't. "I can't imagine a more boring subject," she exclaimed, "than women engineers."
Needless to say, Zuska was not amused. (Neither was Cowan, and she presents a stirring defense of women engineers in her foreword.) A foul rash upon that literary agent and all her ilk!
But something bothers me, beyond the gigantic blind spot of this one ignorant literary agent. I have found something like this attitude in the world of women's studies, where women engineers might think to find some of their best allies.
What do I mean? Isn't it true that some of the best theory and critiques of science have come out of women's studies? Yes, they have, and I've learned a lot from them. But at the end of the day, little of it is of use when it comes to the practical issues faced by women engineers - which are, quite simply, issues of access and climate.
Why is so much of feminist science theory of so little practical use to women engineers? There are several reasons.
- Feminist science theory tends to look at science as a text to be read and interpreted - another fertile field for the tools of the humanities to plow (literary theory, historical analysis, philosophical analysis, etc.). These approaches yield many interesting insights but they often end (or seem so to scientists) in views of science as only oppressive, never useful. An annoying tendency to deny that anyone could ever actually know anything as fact also is a turn-off for most science and engineering types, who believe in things like vaccines and bridges.
- Feminist analyses have been long on critique and short on recommendations for change. Yes, there is a lot that is wrong with the way Western science is practiced. But how do we do it better? Specifically, how do we do better at getting more women to do science and engineering? (Not completely their fault, it's a huge thorny issue that many people are grappling with.)
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So finally, this is the one I am least forgiving about: many feminists have found actual women scientists and engineers to be, well, uninteresting.
Let me expand on that last point. Feminists who are not scientists or engineers are, for the most part, not interested in issues of access and climate, which are the main concerns of women at the front lines in these fields. In contrast, women scientists and engineers, many of whom may not openly declare themselves to be feminists, may not have time for or may be baffled by much of the dense theoretical writing that is produced in feminist science studies. Those writing dense theoretical tracts want to be on the "cutting edge" of their field and want to get tenure. You probably don't do those things in their fields by writing about access issues for women engineers. And quite frankly, many of them are not interested in "just" increasing the numbers of women - they want to "transform" science. Though how they think this is going to happen just by writing dense theory, I am not sure.
I used to think transformation of science was the big goal. But I have come to believe that the main and first goal must be to open up access to all those who have been denied a place in the lab. I don't care if they are feminist or not. I just want get lots of different kinds of folks in there. Transformation will happen when there are enough different kinds of people doing science and engineering to make (A) talking about transformation a less risky proposition for those practitioners and (B) a natural outcome of just having so many different kinds of people, asking different questions.
7:45:07 PM 
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