A Remarkable Number of Women: Discrimination in the Lab
A Remarkable Number of Women - Manage Your Career - the Chronicle of Higher Education
You can tell you’re in a male-dominated discipline in the sciences when a gathering of three or more women working, standing, or sitting together in a professional setting in that field is considered “remarkable.”
Three seems to be the magic number. When at least three women are collaborating in a male-oriented discipline or conversing together at a conference, they tend to attract comments, some unwelcome. Recently I have heard male scholars make the following comments:
Regarding three female scientists listed as principal investigators on a grant proposal: “That’s too many women on one project.”
Regarding three female scientists (and no men) as organizers of a conference session: “Don’t they like men?”
Regarding three female scientists talking in a corridor of a science building on a campus: “Is this a Girl Scout meeting?”