Out of sheer luck of the calendar, this month’s Science Grrl falls on Veterans Day so I had to dedicate this month’s column to the Goddess of Science Grrl Veterans…Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper who has an entire conference named after her. Hopper entered the Navy under the WAVES program.
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Fellow GWPenner Lori mentioned Lise Eliot’s recent book Pink Brain, Blue Brain last month. In my reading of the book, I found Eliot’s balance between nature versus nurture commendable. Despite being a science grrl, I do find myself wanting nurture to win out since then it would be just darn easier to toss out the pink and blue crap.
I hate seeing toys that have no gender to them, like laptop computers, painted pink for girls and not-pink for boys. This country has a problem with the low number of students who want to study computer science, especially girls. I don’t think that having pink laptops will get girls to want to study computer science. But in my conversation with Eliot, she suggests that we hijack this pinkification of our girls world and give it to them, but be subversive too.
But how far do we allow it to go? The Discovery Channel is a great place to find science toys online, but even they separate out girls and boys toys. If you look at the toys offered, a very small number are stereotypical. I assume that they are buying into parents who will come to an online store and immediately look for the boys tab. But I think that the Discovery Channel would do a world of difference for girls in science if they simply had age segregation for their toys. Send a message to parents and gift-buyers that science is gender neutral.
We are shortchanging our girls by making all their things pink. It tells them that their things are different. Luckily the Discovery Channel gender-segregated toy store doesn’t house a pink microscope. So perhaps they are being subversive when a parent goes on and sees “Oh, a girl microscope!” and really it’s just a plain old microscope. I can’t only hope.
Pink Girl, Blue Girl is an excellent read and I believe if we followed Dr. Eliot’s recommendations as we raise our kids, we will see more girls in science.
Comments
gwp_admin — November 12, 2009
Hi Veronica....As I mentioned in my blog post last week or so, I also think Lise Eliot's book is fascinating and deserves a wide audience. It's interesting that the arguments made by many second-wave feminists--the case they made for non-sexist childrearing in the 1970s--are similar to some of Eliot's arguments about facilitating a kind of "neuro-equality" among boys and girls today. The difference, though, lies in Eliot's scientific worldview and her claims about neuroplasticity: for the earlier feminists, socialization, feminist politics, psychological development and self-esteem, and educational equity were the rationales for introducing boys and girls to non-gender-stereotypical skills and experiences. Now, with advances in brain imaging, functional MRIs, and other research findings in neuroscience, parents and teachers will now be thinking about gender and childrearing in terms of brain plasticity and helping to "wire" kids' neuronal connections in ways that prepare them for a wider range of skills, abilities, and opportunities. It's striking how seldom Eliot refers explicitly to feminism (the word doesn't appear in the index, for example), yet her whole outlook and focus on how we can help "even up" gender differences is implicitly feminist--a result, no doubt, of Eliot's own socialization and achievements as a scientist in what is still a male-dominated profession.
I look forward to your future posts...
gwp_admin — November 13, 2009
Is this Deborah commenting?
I think it is smart that Eliot doesn't talk about feminism. It's a very feminist book and in my interview with her, she states unequivocally that she's a feminist. I think if she had woven in feminism too much, it would turn off parents who need to read this.
Her discussion of mean girls within the debate over girls are empathetic was one of my favorite points. But her firm statement that we must fight the pink wave as long as possible really made me smile. That was in the interview too.
Thanks!
Lori Rotskoff — November 13, 2009
No, it wasn't Debbie--the above commentor is me, Lori Rotskoff, who didn't realize that it would say "admin." Sorry about that, but it's me. Why does it say "admin"? Anyway, c'est moi...
and yes, I think it was deliberate and strategic of Eliot not to emphasize feminism per se. this happens all the time in recent books, I think.
On a personal note, I don't have daughters, so I am not "fighting the pink" on my own homefront. I do have two boys who are imaginative and creative; they love all the boy toys, but they also love art. My 8-year old is one of two boys in his after school art club (out of 12 or so kids) and he isn't fazed by that. In his cartooning class, though, is at least half boys--chalk it up to the influence of comics, superheroes, and all the rest.