News and Events
Transnational Feminist Dialogues on Decolonizing Science and Technology
Thursday, 09.02.2023, Time: 4 - 6 pm (CET), online event on Webex Meetings, registration: www.mvbz.fu-berlin.de/registration-tfd
The Margherita von Brentano Center for Gender Studies at Freie Universität Berlin is organizing for this winter term 2022/23, the fifth edition of the Transnational Feminist Dialogues, under the title: "Transnational Feminist Dialogues on Science, Technology and Society". Our final session brings together speakers from different disciplinary and regional context to discuss different perspectives on decolonizing Science and Technology and to identify needs for future action and research.
Convened and moderated by Prof. Dr. Martina Erlemann and Dr. Tanja Kubes (Research Group of Gender & Science Studies in Physics, FU Berlin)
More information HERE.
Despite manifold efforts of universities to foster diversity, science and technology are still strongly affected by (post)colonial power structures. Indigenous perspectives on technology and science are ignored in STEM knowledge production, as is the fact that minoritized groups are still significantly marginalized in research.
To make science and technology more equitable and diverse, it is time to decolonize existing power structures.
What does it take to decolonize science? Is this even possible? And if so, what structural changes would be needed? What would a decolonized science and technology world look like? Ultimately, what can we all do to advance change?
To discuss these and related pressing issues, the Research Group of Gender & Science Studies in Physics and the Margherita von Brentano Center invite internationally renowned experts to discuss different perspectives on decolonizing Science and Technology and to identify needs for future action and research.
Panelists:
Prof. Dr. Katemari Rosa (Federal University of Bahia, Brazil)
Prof. Dr. Banu Subramaniam (University of Massachusetts, Amherst)
Prof. Dr. Paola Ricaurte Quijano (Tecnológico de Monterrey, Mexico)
Guest Talk: Sealing-Wax and String: How Everyday Things Carried Gender into the Physical Laboratory (Donald L. Opitz, DePaul University, USA)
Thursday, November 10, 2022, 6 p.m. s.t., Hörsaal A, Room 1.3.14, FB Physik, Arnimallee 14, 14195 Berlin
How was the ‘sociomaterial’ culture of experimental physics gendered historically? How did the gendering of laboratory materials draw on everyday practices? This talk focuses on everyday and physics laboratory contexts in which practitioners utilized commonplace, domestic tools like sealing-wax and string, precisely during a period in which laboratories and their technologies grew in scale and sophistication. Notoriously a male bastion, the physical laboratory beckons for detailed, gendered analyses. The gender status of ‘things’ in physical laboratories are inextricable from the gendering of the cultures of the experimental sciences more generally. The transit of sociomaterial things across laboratory thresholds provides an opportunity for observing how the gendering of things at times remains durable and at other times is reconfigured. This case study of sealing-wax and string offers critical clues for understanding the wide gender gap that has historically persisted in the physical sciences and engineering.
Donald L. Opitz is Associate Professor at DePaul University (USA). His research engages themes in the areas of women, gender, and science, especially in the British Empire. He is an editor of For Better or For Worse? Collaborative Couples in the Sciences (2012) and Domesticity in the Making of Modern Science (2016). He is a general editor of the forthcoming series, Gender, Colonialism, and Science: A Cross-Cultural Compendium of Primary Sources.
The flyer for the event can be found here as a pdf file.
DIPHER 2022 - Diversity in physics for the diversity of physics
25-27 October 2022, Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg
The conference DIPHER 2022 is organized by the Physics Department of the FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg, the Physics Diversity Network PHYDINE and the Max-Planck-Institute for the Science of Light (MPI). The conference connects both aspects of diversity and combines talks on physics and on gender and diversity alongside workshops and panel discussions. Among the invited speakers is Prof. Dr Martina Erlemann who will talk on gender & diversity in the cultures of physics. For more details see here.
German Conference on Women in Physics
Nov 25, 2022
The 26th German Conference on Women in Physics will take place from 24-27 November 2022 at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and will bring together physicists for networking and professional exchange on various topics of physics research as well as equal opportunities, work-life balance and career development. The working group Erlemann will be represented at the conference by Andrea Bossmann, who will give the invited Keynote/Gender Highlight Lecture on 25.11.2022.
Further information can be found on the conference website: https://indico.scc.kit.edu/event/2604/
New research assistant: Andrea Bossmann
July 01, 2022
As of July 01, 2022 Andrea Bossmann is part of the AG Erlemann/Science Studies. You can find more information here.
Celebrating Women* in Physics
5 May 2022, Vienna University
To celebrate the International Day of Women* and Girls* in Science, the students of the Vienna Doctoral School in Physics invite to participate in a free one-day event that aims to highlight careers and experiences of women* in physics in Austria with a multifaceted scientific programme. Part of the programme is the Workshop on Science Cultures ("Fachkultur") in Physics led by Martina Erlemann.
For the complete program see here.
Research Group Pitches – Physicists present their scientific work and teams
Jan 26, 2022 | 05:00 PM s.t. - 07:00 PM, online
Different research groups present their teams and key scientific areas. We will also present our work. For more information click here.
New research assistant: Dr. Tanja Kubes
Nov 01, 2021
Since Nov 01, 2021 Dr. Tanja Kubes is part of the AG Erlemann/Science Studies. More information about Tanja Kubes' work and teaching can be found here.