Recently, a friend of mine sent me a journal article entitled, “Are STEM Syllabi Gendered? A Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis,” and a response to the research from a rather conservative publication, the National Review: “Female Researcher: We Must Make STEM Courses ‘Less Competitive’ to be more ‘Inclusive’ of Women.” Not a feminist or feminist scholar himself, his question to me was whether or not the author of the original research article, Laura Parson, was sexist and/or racist for suggesting that course syllabi needed to be, or rather sound, less “difficult,” less competitive, etc.
For those of you who don’t know, STEM educations refers to education in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics; and within the United States, women are significantly underrepresented within these fields. I share these articles and my friend’s question in this blog because I believe there is a common misconception that feminist and other liberative educators are arguing that we need to make courses “easier” or “less intimidating” in order to create inclusion. The implication here, that somehow women and/or people of color need an easier course, can be understood as a sexist and racist assertion of inferiority. However, this common critique misses its own investment in kyriarchal codes. Conflating masculinist pedagogical practices with academic rigor, this circular logic redirects the responsibility for inclusion onto the oppressed themselves as though the supposedly “intimidated minority,” is deficient, not the exclusivist language and practices that reinscribe power for particular people and particular ways of being. Continue reading “STEM and Sexism: Pedagogical Responses to “Chilly Climates” by Sara Frykenberg”
Feminism and Religion 