genDADA D etecting Gender: Knowledge-Making in Physics A pplying Physics at our Service change science science studies Crossing Perspectives on Gender and Physics Centre for Gender Research University of Uppsala/Sweden Anna Danielsson Helene Götschel Elvira Scheich Pia Thörngren Staffan Wennerholm The A nomaly of a Woman in Physics D ynamics of a Masculine Field: Learning & Teaching

Detecting Gender: Knowledge-Making in Physics Goal: Detecting the gender bias in physics and enhancing the potentialities of physics for conceptualizing and modelling dynamical complexities. Questions: How is research in physics restricted by a gendered notions of nature and science, and how are they transfigured into abstract and hierarchical forms of knowledge? Methodological Approaches: Historical-systematical analysis of scientific paradgims, of experimental arrangements and of the self-descriptions of the scientific community. Theoretical Ressources: Linking the history of objectivity, laboratory studies, epistemology and gender theory, we seek to understand how theoretical principles as well as standards in experimental research are embedded in exclusionary social practices. Moreover, we want to know which/whose problems are marginalized and which/whose ideas are thereby neglected. Making Connections: To raise the issue, what kind of models are to be prefered from a gender-critical perspective, requires further analytical dimensions. Here, the concept of “situated knowledges” allows us to connect the cognitive and social dimensions of doing physics and enforces an understanding of physics as a collective process of acquiring and doing gender. With respect to modern physics, its revolutionary theoretical ideas and its overwhelming success far beyond the disciplinary boundaries, we are investigating the dynamical blending of a boyish zest for discovery with mathematical geniality as well as with technological and political power into a dominant thought style of physics. → back gender

The Anomaly of a Woman in Physics Goal: Explaining how women become “anomalies” in the deeply rooted male cultures of physics, in order to clear away the multiple barriers against women in the scientific community and its institutions. Questions: How and why are women’s identities as insiders and outsiders created in and by the scientific structures? What female experiences can be investigated? Methodological Approaches: From historical and sociological viewpoints, we study how male and female physicists are perceived and how they perceive themselves in the scientific and academic environment. Theoretical Ressources: We particularly take an interest in the margins of physics where most women have been working. This also entails an interest in the power structures that have created a gendered distribution of influence, credibility and options. We explore different elements of the male tradition of physics, namely the professional memory and its gendering within in the local systems of “disciples” as well as the shaping of the discipline as a whole, whereby physicists define the people fit to be part of it. Are these structures disturbed by migrations in the wake of wars and “brain drains”? Making Connections: The training of physicists and the relationship between teacher and student carries great weight in defining “who” is a physicist. Seeing physics as a set of collective practices acknowledges the importance of teachers and collaborators for the careers of female physicists. In addition, this gender perspective leads us to rethink the analytical frameworks in history and sociology of science. → back

Dynamics of a Masculine Field: Learning & Teaching Goal: Understanding the experience of learning and teaching of physics from a gender perspective and transforming physics education through the application of feminist and other anti- oppressive pedagogies. Questions: How does gender influence the teaching and learning of physics? How can a gender perspective help us understand the learning of physics? When teaching physics, how can we improve the teaching by taking gender issues into account? What could a liberating physics education look like? How can a widened understanding of physics improve the teaching and learning of physics? Methodological Approaches: Feminist pedagogy, participant observation, interviewing, video- recordings, action research, curriculum analysis. Theoretical Resources: Feminist pedagogy, epistemology, gender theory, situated learning theory, positioning theory, narrative inquiry. Making Connections: In order to apprehend students’ simultaneous doing of physics and doing of gender we need to contextualise the knowledge of physics and its applications. We also have to make the history and experiences of women in physics visible, their individual struggles and especially their efforts to remove misogenous disciplinary structures, as the contributions of women physicist to physics education. → back

Applying Physics at our Service Goal: Envisioning physics as a sustainable science. Question: How can physical knowledge contribute to deal with environmental problems such as the global climate change and the necesseity to reduced energy consumption in a gender balanced way? Or, how to assess new technoscientific developments like nanotechnologies from a gender perspective? Methodological Approaches: Transdisciplinary research and its aim to engage both scientific experts and other social actors into a process of mutual learning Theoretical Ressources: Gender Mainstreaming and the critical discussion in gender studies as well as the categories developed in the Gender Impact Assessment are regarded as key instruments to strengthen the feminist perspectives in the communication between public and the sciences. Making Connections: Women’s empowerment in politics, science and technology is seen as essential for the establishment of sustainable science. This goal requires a complex notion of gender that takes into account the horizontal and vertical gender segregations in physics as well as the learning processes, that generated them. We seek the structural gaps and contradictions in the extended gender regimes of science and technology in order to uncover the possibilities to undo gender hierachies and to develop conceptions of nature and of science with respect to the diversity of practices and practical problems. → back