Why a Women’s Caucus blog? November 6, 2010
Posted by psawomenscaucusblog in "Why" questions, Administrative.trackback
To answer that question, we need to say something about another question: Why a Women’s Caucus?
The PSA Women’s Caucus was founded in November, 2006 at the PSA meeting in Vancouver, BC. The goals of the Caucus are to informally mentor women entering the philosophy of science, to provide an opportunity for networking among the women of the PSA, to raise the visibility of women in the field, and to address any concerns about women and gender in the PSA.
These are important goals, but some of them are hard to accomplish in a breakfast meeting every two years, or by way of emails to a listserv. Some of the mentoring, networking, and support we might be seeking (or offering) might, in a perfect world, be the kind of thing we’d exchange by the water cooler or coffee machine in a lounge furnished with whiteboards and comfy chairs.
Given that we are spatially dispersed, existing in different time zones (and with different constraints on our time even when we share time zones), it’s my hope that this blog can function like a virtual lounge, furnished with cyberspace whiteboards, creating a space that offers enough comfort for the conversations that will keep us going and enough challenge to keep us honest and engaged. With your help, this will be a place where we can describe our experiences, share our advice, and ask each other for help strategizing, whether about our careers or the philosophical problems that are currently captivating us.
– Janet D. Stemwedel
I just like to be the first. Thanks for setting up the blog Janet.
Thanks for setting this up, Janet, and to Kathleen and Kristen for putting together such a lovely and productive meeting this year!
Since this blog is supposed to be an open forum for us, I’ll go ahead and voice an opinion that I was, as a graduate student, too shy/sleepy to voice aloud at the meeting yesterday. I strongly agree with Sandy Mitchell’s point that the women’s caucus prize should not be limited to feminist epistemology and science and values things. As a woman working on philosophy of chemistry, an already-underrepresented field, I was quite disappointed to hear that the women’s caucus prize would be yet another discipline-specific prize that I would find myself excluded from. So I applaud the effort to raise funds for a second prize, and I will tentatively offer my services toward that effort, if they are needed–and if they don’t interfere with my prospectus.
My thanks too!
I have a question for the group. Perhaps there is a better place to put it, but for now, here it is.
I am curious about what percentage of their time folks spend reviewing papers and performing other professional service duties. Just to offer some calibration, I am several years into being an associate professor and have a fairly high teaching load.
I face the pretty standard conflict between setting aside time for my own research and reviewing papers in a constructive manner. I have greatly benefitted from reviews of my own work that are probably best thought of as mentoring and feel a strong need to pay that benefit forward. This feeling is especially strong when it comes to feminist papers, for all the obvious reasons.
So, I am curious about how other people balance these aspects of their work and when other people “just say no.”
best,
Carla
Thank you Janet–this is terrific!