Description du projet
Redresser le déséquilibre hommes-femmes dans le monde de la physique
Si l’on compare la situation actuelle avec celle d’il y a plusieurs décennies, les femmes sont plus nombreuses qu’avant à se lancer dans une carrière de physicienne, mais elles demeurent sous-représentées par rapport aux hommes, en particulier aux postes de haut niveau. Ce déséquilibre hommes-femmes entraîne une perte de talents potentiels et prive le monde de la physique de la contribution intellectuelle des femmes. Si des efforts ont été déployés pour aplanir les obstacles et éliminer les contraintes qui entravent la participation des femmes dans l’industrie, leur dimension reste très générale. Fort du soutien du programme Actions Marie Skłodowska-Curie, le projet INCLUDE tiendra compte des structures cachées sous-jacentes de la culture de la physique qui contribuent à l’inégalité entre les genres. Plus particulièrement, il créera un cadre interdisciplinaire permettant d’évaluer les structures, les représentations, les politiques et les pratiques qui alimentent l’inégalité entre les hommes et les gemmes dans l’enseignement de la physique.
Objectif
The discipline of physics has been grappling with the issue of gender imbalance for decades. The underrepresentation of women in physics profoundly affects the growth and future of the field by contributing to a loss of potential talent and deprives industry of the intellectual contribution of women with a physics background. Those women physicists who enter the workplace remain dramatically outnumbered especially within senior management. The persistence of this gender imbalance suggests that it is due to a combination of many factors, interacting dynamically in complex ways, necessitating holistic and integral solutions. Interventions, so far, have been generic and have focussed overwhelmingly on the micro-level (individual learner, teacher, employer, and family). The thesis of this project is that measures taken to increase representation will be effective only when they include addressing underlying hidden structures of the physics culture that contribute to the gender inequality. In order to unpack the factors that shape how physics engages with women, this work employs semi-structured, artefact-based ethnographic interviews of third-level students (physics and non-physics) and physics academic staff drawn from two institutions in culturally different environments. An interdisciplinary framework will be established to articulate structures, representations, policies and practices that contribute to the gender inequality in third-level physics education. The processes involved will identify the tangible structural changes that can be implemented. The outcomes of this work will empower physics departments internationally to move beyond generic strategies and to implement tailored action plans to address gender imbalance by on-going, collaborative self-reflexivity. These processes and outcomes are transferable to other underrepresented populations in STEM fields and careers, and hence carry academic and economic implications.
Champ scientifique
Programme(s)
- HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Main Programme
Régime de financement
HORIZON-AG-UN - HORIZON Unit GrantCoordinateur
4 Dublin
Irlande