Gendered Power Relations and Sexual Harassment in Antarctic Science in the Age of #MeToo

Gendered Power Relations and Sexual Harassment in Antarctic Science in the Age of #MeToo

Antarctica is a remote, historically masculine place. It is also a workplace, and the human interactions there are connected to power structures and gendered expectations. Today, more than half early career polar researchers are women. However, women in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics,...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Australian feminist studies 2020-07, Vol.35 (105), p.261-276
Main Authors: Nash, Meredith, Nielsen, Hanne
Format: Article
Language:eng
Subjects:
Antarctica
Fairness
feminism
fieldwork
Foreign students
Gender
Graduate students
Identity politics
Masculinity
Mathematics
Medicine
Men
Methodological problems
Power
Power structure
Science
Science and technology
Sexual harassment
STEMM
Structural change
Termination
Women
Workplaces
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Summary:Antarctica is a remote, historically masculine place. It is also a workplace, and the human interactions there are connected to power structures and gendered expectations. Today, more than half early career polar researchers are women. However, women in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine (STEMM) are also more likely than men to experience sexual harassment during fieldwork making questions of safety, power, and harassment pertinent. Gender equity initiatives coupled with #MeToo have provided new platforms for reporting sexual harassment and challenging problematic research cultures which position science as meritocratic and gender-neutral. Yet, the impact of #MeToo in Antarctic science is uneven. Following revelations of his harassment of female graduate students in the international media, the termination of Professor David Marchant is widely cited as evidence that #MeToo is positively affecting Antarctic science. We argue it is problematic to focus on individual cases at the expense of the wider culture. We examine the complex historical (e.g. gendered interactions with the Antarctic landscape), cultural (e.g. identity politics), and relational (e.g. gendered power dynamics) tensions underpinning recent #MeToo revelations in Antarctic science with a view to providing more nuanced approaches to structural change.
ISSN:0816-4649
1465-3303