ACADEMIC NATIONALITY: HOW THE .EDU BONUS HELPS U.S. ACADEMICS ABROAD
A book talk by Kathrin Zippel on April 9 (Mon) at 12 PM in Knox 509
Abstract: Scientific and engineering research is increasingly global, and international collaboration can be essential to academic success. Yet even as administrators and policymakers extol the benefits of global science, few recognize the diversity of international research collaborations and their participants, or take gendered inequalities into account. Zippel consider systematically the challenges and opportunities that the globalization of scientific work brings to U.S. academics, especially for women faculty. I argue that the .edu bonus – that is the status associated with U.S. science provides privileges to U.S. academics and women in particular. STEM fields are a case study, where gendered cultures and structures in academia have contributed to an underrepresentation of women. While some have approached underrepresentation as a national concern with a national solution, Zippel highlights how gender relations are reconfigured in global academia. For U.S. women in particular, international collaboration offers opportunities to step outside of exclusionary networks at home. International collaboration is not the panacea to gendered inequalities in academia, but, as Zippel argues, international considerations can be key to ending the steady attrition of women in STEM fields and developing a more inclusive academic world.
Speaker: Kathrin Zippel is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Northeastern University. She has published on gender politics in the workplace, public and social policy, social movements, welfare states, and globalization in the United States and Europe. Her book The Politics of Sexual Harassment in the United States, the European Union and Germany (Cambridge University Press) won several awards. Her current research explores gender and global transformations of science and education. In her new book, Women in Global Science: Advancing Careers Through International Collaboration (Stanford University Press), she argues that global science is the new frontier for women, providing both opportunities and challenges as gender shapes the dynamics and practices of international research.
Sponsors: Center for Organizational Innovation, Gender and Sexuality Workshop and SKAT Workshop of the Department of Sociology, Columbia University
Location: Room 509 in Knox Hall, located at 606 West 122nd Street
