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WOMEN IN THE SCIENTIFIC ELITE
We can see here that identifying with feminists led to supporting more
radical, collective action, and thatthere is a substantial critical attitude toward
gender stereotypes.?®!
4th group: the “classical equality” type (progressive non-identifiers)
A separate category was composed ofthose few interviewees who deemed that
in science there is no need to care about who is male and who is female. They
all stressed that they are present in their field not as women, but as repre¬
sentatives of themselves and their scientific area. Identification with the clus¬
ter of women was at its lowest in this group. They exclusively stressed legal
equality, which they find to be sufficient for women as well. They find themselves
to be more akin to their husbands / other men in the profession, or they did
not address the issue of gender at all. The identification with a professional
identity considered to be “manly” is clearly present in this model.*® The “pro¬
gressive non-identifiers” of GIM (“non-identifiers” according to the multi¬
dimensional model, i. e. the MIA) identify neither with women nor feminists.
They can however be linked to a branch of feminism that undermines woman¬
hood and emphasises only legal (classical) equality. This is why all of them are
explicitly against the gender issue appearing in the scientific field at all. They
firmly state that gender is not relevant in science at all. Which is why they are
completely indifferent to the number of female academicians.
I don’t really like this “women need to be academicians too!” initiative. I think
nobody intends to dance, so why is it not completely irrelevant who is a man or a
woman at the Academy? If they really intend to be gender neutral, the question
of how many men and women there are should not even arise. Whoever has the
ambition on one hand and the merit on the other, should become an Academician,
regardless of them being a man or a woman. (Subject no. 22, natural sciences)
They think the numbers are misleading, because performance is all that
matters. Therefore, the fact that there are only a few women at the academy is
not considered an issue by them. They in fact emphasise that if women are
really successful in their own field, that minor proportion should be just as
sufficient in shaping a model role. They are in agreement in the opinion that
receiving any sort of advantage solely because of being (born as) a biological
woman is degrading and counter-productive. Their conclusion is that the issue
281 Van Breen et al.: A Multiple Identity, 9.
282 Becker—Wagner: Doing Gender Differently.
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