When reading the posts below, I was reminded of a conversation I had
with my father, an engineer, while I was in high school. I was talking to
him about what I might study in college. I was very good at math, but he
said I definitely should not go into engineering, because he wouldn't want
to work with me if I was an engineer because he didn't like to work with
women engineers and either did any of his (male) colleagues. This was so
offputting to me that I never even considered an engineering major in
college. I guess I just assumed that all male engineers would be similarly
hostile to women and wanted no part of that. I'm sure my father doesn't
remember that short conversation, but it made a huge impression on me.
Megan Brown
mbrown at fred.fhcrc.org
Bharathi Jagadeesh (bjag at ln.nimh.nih.gov) wrote:
: S L Forsburg <forsburg at nospamsalk.edu> writes
: > 2) the discomfort level of older men mentoring younger women. They
: > are awkward and uncomfortable, as if they are always waiting for the
: > women either to cry or make a pass at them. MUCH easier for
: > them to put their efforts behind young men, whose style of
: > interaction they are familiar with. No difficult in communicating
: > there, since they are both reading from the same manual. Since
: > most senior faculty are men, this is a HUGE problem.
: Yup, I find that older men can work around this, but only if you help
: them.
: Old men were told this by their fathers and grandfathers, that women
: will cry, be driven mad with desire, or accuse them of making advances;
: they were taught that women need to be protected from the turmoil of the
: world. Even my husband, (who is only in his 30's) was told by his father
: that women melt in the rain, and need to be dropped off directly at the
: door when there is water in the air.
: They can be taught the foolishness of this advice, but in positively
: accepting women students they are walking in strange territory, strange
: to their upbringing, and strange to the profession. Even if they try
: their best to communicate with the women who were never expected to be
: their colleagues when they grew up in the segregated society of
: theirchildhood, it's something that the women need to help them with.
: > 3) the walking-on-eggshell phenomenon--"women can't take criticism",
: > so we just won't give it to them, or "anything I do, women will
: > accuse me of harrassment" so we just won't interact with them.
--
Megan Brown
mbrown at fred.fhcrc.org
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Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Seattle, Washington
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