Speaker
Description
Marie Curie, with her two Nobel prizes, is presented as the icon of a female physicist, even as a role model for young women, showing that women can excel in physics. However, when she is put forward, a question arises: If geniality and hard work are the only things that are needed to make scientific discoveries, why is she the lone female star in the history of physics?
This presentation leads us to the discussion of why there are so few women in physics by taking its point of departure the in the biographies of three female Nobel laureates in the history of physics: Marie Curie, Irène Joliot-Curie and Maria Goeppert-Mayer. What was needed more than geniality to make it possible for these women to be the only female Nobel laureates in physics (and chemistry) in more than sixty years? We learn that there were many contextual factors that made it possible: Family background, education, economic conditions, childcare options, supportive husbands and other male advocates – and luck. By looking at Lise Meitner we can see how even such good conditions can be overtrumped by a birth categorization.
Considering that scientific discoveries are always made in a scientific and societal context, we can reflect on what has changed until today and how. Whose intelligence can be unleashed today for scientific achievements and whose is more likely to be restricted? How does that relate to gender, sexuality, and marginalized identities?
