Background

In my continuing observations of the neoliberal academic ecosystem, I reflect on the status of women (and stereotypically feminized pro-social labor) in academia, particularly in STEM, and offer a semi-autobiographical, self-critical account from a biological scientist perspective observing and experiencing academia as a distinct ecological habitat.

In this reflection, I draw inspiration quite heavily from the work of Nancy Fraser (who I learned of thanks to Glass Museum) as well as many of the references nicely summarized in this essay by Jain et al.

For more observations, see University Professors in the Neoliberal Academic Ecosystem and Artificial Intelligence among University Professors

Women and pro-social labor in the neoliberal academic ecosystem

Women - despite comprising approximately 50% of the human population, represent less than 30% of the STEM work force with even fewer in positions of leadership. As a result of this population imbalance, early female pioneers into the STEM ecosystem were subject to extreme environmental pressures that selected for a phenotypic subset well-aligned to the male-dominant subculture as the privileges and opportunities extended to us were contingent on our disassociation from the feminine and the rejection of stereotypically feminized pro-social labor.

Because if sympathy led women to be stereotyped as emotional, then we had to become the least emotional person in the room. If the feminine was seen as unserious and unworthy of financial compensation, then we had to trade in our feminine frilly dresses for masculine boy blazers and our natural voices for a comical baritone. So, we distanced ourselves from ‘the other girls’ in hopes of self-preservative.

And despite being held to biased metrics that question our competence, intellect, productivity, and leadership quality, some of us managed to overcome the odds and achieve those metrics anyway. But goalpost seemed always moving, the glass ceiling ever higher. When women achieved merits, these merits were assumed to be ill gained. When women were given awards, those awards became less prestigious.

Systemic issues were reframed as personal failures with individualized solutions. We were told women just needed to dream big. But while dreams are universal, opportunity has never been, so the dreams of many were simply quashed. We were told women just needed to ask for it, as long as these asks did not include maternity leave that could jeopardize status-quo neoliberal indicators of economic value. We were told women just needed to lean in, only no one noticed that we were already leaning in so hard that we were practically horizontal. While we were told the problem was our vocal fry, what we really needed was a different set of chromosomes. Or more realistically, actual transformative change beyond affirmative remedies.

Representation is the most visible of affirmative remedies. Indeed, whenever I speak on this topic, that one guy in my department is always quick to point out: well, there’s at least one woman here. Women are represented. Therefore, equity has been achieved. So, whenever a committee needs a woman to chair that committee on departmental climate, they find her. Whenever a committee needs ten women, they find the same woman ten times. The representation of a few exceptional women is used to justify a system where you too could succeed if only you were exceptional. But equity is not achieved when there exists a few exceptional women. It is achieved when women no longer have to be exceptional to be exist. And while representation is necessary, it is not sufficient when it does not address the structural inequities that produced the lack of representation in the first place, Overcoming such structural inequities requires changing the cultural valuations (as well as their legal and practical expressions) that privilege hyperoptimizing your h-index while denying equal respect to student training and service. Everyone wants someone else to put away reagents, maintain the servers, and mentor the undergraduates so they can reap the benefits of a well-stocked lab, a functional computing system, and a well-trained PhD student body. Because such pro-social labor has always been a resource to be extracted from rather than contributed to. People, often women but also men, who do this type of work fought hard for a seat at the table, only to be place on the menu. So, they slowly leaked out of the pipeline, and everyone reacted with a surprised Pikachu face.

For those of us still here in the pipeline, let me just say: We earned our expertise. We belong here. But belonging doesn’t require becoming an ambassador for the values that excluded us in the first place. There’s a difference between understanding and playing by the rules to survive and believing these rules deserve to exist and be followed in the first place. We don’t owe the system our loyalty simply because it finally made room for us. Yes, being here is a privilege. Acknowledging my privilege does not mean I’m apologizing for it. But acknowledging is the first step to consciously wielding this privilege to explicitly address our oppressions because that is how we will best create the opportunity for change. The next generation doesn’t need more gatekeepers who happen to be women. It needs leaders willing to imagine a form of excellence that doesn’t have to look exactly like it did fifty years ago. We must change the nature of power, rather than letting power change us. May we all strive to be who we needed when we were younger.