"It's not for women."

I hear that more frequently than my male coworkers would like to admit.  Perhaps that's why I don't find the new commercial for Dr. Pepper 10 very funny.




Call me humorless.  That's fine.  But let's keep in mind that I hear (at least several times a month) "oh, there's no boy's club..."   If you have to insist that something DOESN'T exist.....  well, I'll let you just finish that one.

Why it is awesome being female (at a conference)

As you all probably have guessed by now, I'm woefully behind in my blog reading.

Luckily, I did manage to catch a semi-recent post by The Prodigal Academic about why it is awesome to be a female attending male-dominated conferences.

TPA points out that there are no bathroom lines when you are one of a handful of women at a conference.  So true!  In fact, at a recent conference, another conference attendee (a rock star Big Name) was so surprised to have someone else walk into the bathroom (me), that we actually struck up a conversation....which led to talking about my research with my students.  Awesome.

The second advantage that TPA lists is that, as a minority presenter, you are more easily remembered later in the day.

The third deals with presenting while pregnant.  You can read it for yourself, since it doesn't pertain to me (whew).

The fourth is my favorite because it happens to be true AND I had never really thought about it before:

4. You are easier to find in the crowd, so it is easier to run into old friends and colleagues at coffee breaks without necessarily prearranging things.  (link)

And TPA's fifth advantage to attending a male-dominated conference?  Well, let's just say it deals with getting free stuff.


So what about it?  Are there more advantages that should be added to The Prodigal Academic's list?  Or do the wee annoyances (you know, like being asked eight times in one afternoon if you REALLY are a presenter and not a vendor representative) outweigh these benefits?

Things I Don't Think My Male Coworkers Have to Hear

Some of my coworkers insist that men and women are treated the same at my college.

Really?

'Cause I'm pretty sure my male coworkers have never had any of the following told to them / asked of them:


- I'm glad you don't have kids; you really have your work priorities in order.

- Breast feeding isn't that big of a deal.  You can do the...uh...pump thing in your office just fine.  (Said by a male coworker to a female coworker)

- X (a female) must be hormonal.

-  Why is X (a female) asking for a sabbatical?  Didn't she just get maternity leave a year ago?

- I don't know why X (a female) needs maternity leave.  When my wife had a baby, I was back to work the next week.  (huh??!)

- I can't believe X (a female) would bring her child to work this one time!

- I think X (a male) is AMAZING for bringing his child to work this one time!  What a lucky wife he has!

- Don't have kids until after tenure.  Of course, I legally can't tell you that.  Wink wink.

- Have kids soon before you get too old to carry them.

- Can you go talk to Undergrad (a female) about her boobs?  (Seriously)






Okay, please share.


Oh, and men: please share the things that female coworkers DARE to say to you, if you're feeling brave.

Yes, please assume I'm PMSing

The other day, I was talking with another colleague about the way that students perceive male vs. female professors. I stated that our male colleagues could simply get away with "more" in the classroom, without repercussions-- or even a reaction-- from their students. I gave the example of a male assistant prof in a nearby department who is know for his rants in the classroom. "I couldn't get away with that," I claimed. "Sure, I've spoken sternly to my class before, but if I full-on yelled at them, students wouldn't view it as 'oh, that's just Dr. R's way', like they do with X."

A student had been milling around in the hall. She piped up, "Yeah, your class would just think you were PMSing or on your period."

Holy crap.

I suppose people really do think/say stuff like this. I just haven't encountered such sentiments.... at least not to my face.

Am I just lucky (or maybe just naive)? Forget about my students. Are my male COLLEAGUES wondering if an occasional outburst is due to my monthly cycle? I mean, isn't this thinking terribly outdated....not to mention immature?

Should a woman take her husband's name? (A poll)

A continuation from yesterday's post:

What's in a (last) name?

The other day N.A. and I were talking about a former colleague. I commented that I was surprised that she had taken her husband's last name, especially well into her career (just prior to tenure).

"Why would she take his name?" N.A. asked. "She's not proud."

Oh.

Wait a minute.

"So if she kept her name, that would make her proud?" I was confused, especially since we've already talked about my choice to keep my name if/when we get married. (In fact, I posted about it here... the comments are worth a second look, in my opinion.)

"Well, why do you want to keep your name?"

"I like my last name better," I replied, even though he already knew this.

"Well there you go," he answered.

Well, shit. Does staying Dr. Reaction make me conceited?

...or maybe the better question is, if that's true, do I even care?

Can men and women be friends?

You've Got Mail was on TV last night. The first time I saw it, I thought it was a little fluffy but still had a really cute story about the relationship that developed between Meg Ryan's and Tom Hanks' characters.

Last night, I viewed it a little differently. I couldn't even get through it for more than 10 minutes because the premise now left an icky feeling in my stomach. I saw the cute relationship that developed over email for what is actually was: two already-attached people having an emotional affair. Then, after their relationships with their respective partners end, they get together.

Some people say that men and women truly can't be friends.

I'm not really sure what to think. All I know is that I won't be watching chick flicks for awhile.

Do men seek balance, too?

Isis the Scientist recently wrote a response to a Science post on science goddesses and housework. Her post has generated quite the comments, and they are certainly worth a read.

One if the issues brought up in her post and in the comments was that most of the Science posts were directed at women. I was (and still am) curious if scientists who happen to be male even THINK about having balance between the professional and personal worlds. Here is what I commented:

I would be quite interested to know what percentage of your male readership struggles with balance. 100%? 50%? Just Physioprof?

In grad school, none of the male grad students ever talked about feeling conflicted between work and home life. Obviously it could be that they were just putting up a front. But I'm curious.... do male profs *want* articles specifically directed at them?

So what do you think? I'm constantly struggling with how best to balance my work and home lives. Are the men around me just better at hiding their guilt... or have they just figured out the secret to maintaining presence in both worlds?

Hugging like a man?

A recent comment on this old post on group work got me thinking. I'm going to (probably) address portions of Anon's (who is an engineering student, hooray!) comment in some future post(s), but let me reproduce the last bit:

"Group work is ONLY recommended if you have bright, responsible and good students who know they must work as a team. Then it is indeed a very good experience, although I've seldom have had that. Manly hugs."


Hmm...


I've been told that I have a good handshake because I don't "shake like a typical woman."

I've been told that I'm a good lecturer because I "don't lecture like a girl."

But I've never had anyone comment on my hugs. What is a manly hug? Like a quick shoulder slap? I'm not sure what a "womanly" hug would be, probably because my preferred state is to NOT have people touching me.

Especially students.

So I wonder. Could there be a difference between engineering and non-engineering hugs?

A question for the masses: skirting opinion

Frequently, female students are advised not to wear skirts at interviews, with the common wisdom that women will never be taken seriously if they look like...well...women.

I never saw women in skirts at grad school interviews, and I prefer pants anyways. Some of my students have come back from medical school interviews to report that everyone-- men and women-- were in matching black suits with muted colors of Oxford shirts.

Can women wear (nonfrumpy) skirts or dresses without being viewed as unprofessional?



(I suspect that many of you will be in support of hot shoes, but what about the rest of the outfit? And if you aren't familiar with Dr. Isis, click thee over there right away)

Tit Talker

One of my colleagues is a tit talker. Now I fully understand that many people are shy. I will be the first to acknowledge that shy people may tend to look down when they speak in order to avoid eye contact. I also am taller than average and usually wear heels... so that puts my boobs approximately at eye level for several of my colleagues.

But.

I still get vaguely uncomfortable when a coworker constantly talks to my (smaller than average) chest. How do YOU handle a tit talker (and I'm talking to both females and males here)?



Oh, did I mention that this coworker is female?

unfortunate urchins

I'm back from a bit of travel, including a conference at which I gave a talk. At the conference I saw something that I'd never witnessed at a conference before. I've attended, oh, somewhere in the ballpark of 18 regional and national conferences while I've been in graduate school, but I've never seen this:

Children at a conference.

Okay, so the reason I haven't encountered rugrats at science conferences previous could be because

1. People in my field don't have kids.
2. People in my field that have kids have supportive spouses.
3. People in my field that have kids have 100% reliable childcare.

Now one child I could understand. If a female was stuck with them, I would have felt sorry for her. But, double-standard applier as I am, I was mildly horrified that it was the father that brought the little tykes along. Yes, plural: two kids. To an 8 am session.

So if I was only mildly horrified by the morning munchkins, you can imagine my reaction when the numbers increased to a total of SIX kids by the end of the afternoon. We were in a largeish room with about 80 chairs for the 50-odd people in our session, but the noises of the kids-- slamming the water pitchers up and down, crumpling papers, chasing one another about, opening the door, shutting the door, opening the door-- was grating on the nerves.

Now perhaps I'm being insensitive. After all, isn't one of the challenges I am likely, as a soon-to-be female professor, to be faced with is finding reliable childcare?

A female graduate student by any other name...

Many of my fellow female scientists are eventually faced with the decision of changing their surname. Here at LargeU, most of the women that get married before they have publications change their name, while the ones with publications hyphenate.

NA and I actually have had the Name Talk already. (I know. So fast. The next thing you know, we'll have a family-share cell phone plan.) We both have multi-syllable last names, so he agreed that hyphenation was dumb. Our nonexistent kids will have his name, while I will keep mine. (NA is very progressive and not at all territorial, but I had to give up something--in this case, our non-existant kids' last name-- in order to have his promise of me keeping MY last name upon our nonexistent wedding).

While most think that I'm keeping my name because I'm staying in academia or because I have several publications.

Nope, I just like my last name. I think it goes very well with my first name, and, barring marrying into a royal family, I just simply don't want to change it.


My mom (don't even ask how this whole thing came up) thinks NA is extremely awesome for being so agreeable about me keeping my name. I don't particularly understand why guys would care either way.

What about you? Guys, do you think it's important for your wife to take your name? Fellow female scientists, are you planning on changing your name? Have you have problems with pubmed, etc if you hyphenated?

Female Recruits

In the last few years, LargeU has had a great deal of trouble recruiting women into the graduate program. How does this happen? At the application stage, the female to male ratio is representative of nationwide stats. At the offer stage, the same thing. For some reason, once it comes to the decision stage, exceptional women choose to go elsewhere (often to my lower-ranked programs!).

To remedy this, LargeU Admins have decided that renaming a fellowship after a women will help.


Sigh. Seriously?


Does your program do a good job recruiting women? If your grad program doesn't traditionally have a high number of women, then how is your school successful recruiting female students?

Happy International Women's Day!

You can read about it here and here.

I've been so inspired by strong women, both in "real life" and in the blogosphere.

If you have any women-related issues (equality, education, achievements) that you'd like to direct others to, please do comment and direct readers to your blog post or comment websites directly.


(side note: thank you all for your advice and encouraging words re. my thesis progress. I really need to find a progress meter that is in pages, not word count. This morning I'm at 50/200....25% and counting!)

Women hating women

It's a not-so-hidden secret that LargeU has problems with bias against women (both faculty and students). While I myself have never experienced discrimination here at LargeU, some of the stories I have heard are downright shocking (and mostly non-bloggable, and least not until May).

So what to do when the worst offender is a woman? Especially a woman that was recruited to LargeU by herself (as opposed to a "package-deal" with a more famous husband)?