someone used their privilege to do something!

[chibi]

two philosophers have used their professional standing within their community to take a stand and not accept invitations to participate in male only events, see here

they have also challeneged their colleagues to do the same

it is a v male dominated field, but apparently 20% are women - they aren't all stupid, or too busy washing their hair, or phobic about public gatherings

how great would it be if this extended into other fields - i am thinking of the recent amnesty event that was all-male see here

this is how paradigms get shifted, i think

Sorry, for poor formatting and typing. Slow start to the morning I guess.

I would imagine there are studies about academia and gender (I bloody hope so) - there are certainly stats, like this 1 in 5, which are really worrying.

I bet someone on MN is an academic or knows an academic working in that area - someone must study these things.

I don't quite see why it's logical a thread about philosophy would attract those people, but maybe that's just me.

Just popping in to say hi. I have nothing useful to add to the thread except to say how interesting I'm finding it.

While I don't particularly care either way that there are only 20% women in academic philosophy, what's more the problem is that there's likely to be 40% female UGs, 30% female PGs, 20% female junior lecturers, and less than 5% female professors.

This is the case in pretty much every academic subject. Women progress less than men even in female-dominanted areas and it's well known within academia that childbearing is one of the problems here. Childbearing does differentially impact on women attending conferences, to the extent that the Evolutionary Psych conference I tend to go to in Europe has agreed that organisers must always create childcare options for delegates (if only it were that easy to take a toddler around the world on work trips). But this still doesn't prevent the women dissappearing more often than the men and I honestly don't know a single man in my whole subject who complains that it's harder to get to conferences these days, but all the women with young kids do.

In case there are complaints that that's anecedata, there's EU reports on the problems of women's salaries and progression in science, that Blair report someone else refered to, and also I can tell you that 90% of my publications in the last 5 years arose from conversations at conferences/doing visiting lectures.

LRDtheFeministDragon
"You're just making things up now. I never said what you attributed to me. Knock it off, if you can't argue with what we're actually saying, it's not going to help to make up arguments.

It's not paranoia to be worried about the experiences of women academics."

It seems axiomatic in feminism that any male-dominanted environment exists as a consequence of patriarchal discrimination, in the absence of any evidence to establish whether that may be the case. As I've already said, in direct response to your 'argument', you are simply peddling this axiomatic belief with zero evidence to support it.

Your suspicion that these men are actively suppressing the careers of female academics is irrational because you have no proof of it being true. This, by paranoia's definition (see below, no. 2), makes it quite acceptable to call your beliefs exactly that; paranoid.

NameGames
"Then much of medicine is based on paranoia, since research is done on the basis of something being worrying to someone."

Paranoia:

1. a psychosis characterized by systematized delusions of persecution or grandeur usually without hallucinations

2. a tendency on the part of an individual or group toward excessive or irrational suspiciousness and distrustfulness of others

Source: Merriam Webster.

I beg your pardon, but, unless your medicine is of the Dr Gillian McKeith variety, I think you really have no idea what you're talking about. Medical research is based on the existence of diseases' underlying pathology, not on the moaning of hypochondriacs suffering from chronic paranoia.

NameGames
"This is an Internet forum, not an academic journal. Studies could add to the discussion if they exist, but in there absence silence is a very poor alternative. We are here to discuss our ideas. Maybe studies will come out of it one day, or maybe they aren't necessary."

Reliable studies certainly aren't necessary when it comes to filling the silence with ideologically-driven opinion. Unfortunately opinions have a notorious habit of being released from the wrong end of the digestive system.

If women or men don't wish to engage in a particular field of work then so be it. I live in London yet I've only ever seen one female street cleaner. Clearly patriarchal gender-discrimination is at work and a 50/50 quota needs to be enforced and a campaign dedicated towards this objective.

Regarding the above paragraph, studies are tedious to conduct but there is little point in directing energy towards a particular issue when you have no idea what constitutes a positive outcome. That is to say, e.g. in the case of street cleaning, if there is any actual discrimination to be overcome or whether you're simply fighting against peoples' personal choices in order to fulfill a pointless quota.

Uppercut you stated that paranoia was being worried about something without studies to demonstrate it was worrying. I merely pointed out that studies are done because people (researchers or funders) find something worrying, whether their suspicions are confirmed or not (and much research does not find what it expects) - it does not make those researchers paranoid.

If you now wish to back track on your definition of paranoia I think that's fine. The dictionary definition is much better, but inapplicable to this discussion. (Or do you have proof that most of the claims here are delusional, excessive, or irrational? So far you have merely claimed they are.

As to your last, are you saying it isn't an important subject? In which case why are you here?

Personally I thing gender and other imbalances in jobs are important. It may be choice, it may be direct discrimination. But if choice I want to know why would women as a group choose differently to men? Knowing why a job isn't filled with the most meritocratic possible candidates (whether it be philosophers or street sweepers) is important if you are concerned about the fulfillment and happiness of people or the state of the economy.

Uppercut, if we took the example of nursing, around 10% of nurses overall are men. If I heard about a nursing conference where none of the speakers were men, I would also find it concerning.

There are barriers of perception to both genders in certain careers. If a man wants to be a nurse or a woman wants to be a street cleaner, I wouldn't want either to feel, "that's not a job for a man/woman" or to be treated differently by their colleagues or the public whilst in the job.

Does nothing that you observe or deduce concern you until there has been an academic study of that exact subject? It must make it hard to argue with your spouse about whether the house is tidy.

I'm a PhD student in a discipline very closely related to some areas of philosophy, and I was delighted to read about this. Shame on those who have been happy to sit back and enjoy the status quo.

Some stats on women in philosophy for those who still aren't convinced this is a problem (figures taken from the American Philosophical Association website, so they apply to US institutions, but I would expect them to be comparable with Europe). Women are 16.6% of FT, permanent lecturing staff in philosophy, and 26% of PT instructors. So they are underrepresented in the prestigious, permanent faculty jobs as opposed to the low-status, low-paying, zero-job security temporary contract type jobs. Interestingly the percentage of FT women staff in top-51 departments is slightly higher than average: 22%. So better departments have slightly more women. Women make up 21% of all philosophy staff in the US. Across the humanities however, women are 41% of all staff. Philosophy's figure is lower than for any other humanities discipline.

In 2009, 30% of doctorates in philosophy were awarded to women (this is the lowest figure for any humanities subject in that year). Across all disciplines the percentage of women doctoral recipients was 46%. So philosophy is the worst humanity and is worse than mathematics and astrophysics.

In 2008, 37% of bachelors degrees in philosophy (this does include religious studies though) were granted to women. So there is leakage at every level.

Philosophy has a problem.

There is literally a metric shit-ton of studies on gender and academia, which I would dig out for you, if it weren't for the fact I am busy reconsidering my future in the profession.