Crosspost: Assessing the status of women in physics in the 1970s

Today's crosspost is by Anna Doel from the American Institute of Physics, posted on aip.org on May 1, 2026.

Vera Kistiakowsky, at right, at a public hearing on nuclear weapons and disarmament organized by the World Council of Churches in 1981. 

Rob Bogaerts / Anefo, National Archives of the Netherlands. CC-BY-SA.

In August 1971, the American Physical Society issued a call for “names, addresses, comments, and recommendations” that was published in Physics Today, Spectrum, and Science. The goal was to begin to collect data for the newly formed Committee on Women in Physics. Responses to this questionnaire became the basis for the committee’s work to address challenges women physicists experienced at all stages of career, from first-year college students to well-established researchers.

The latter group knew a lot about the then-status of women in American science. They were of the generation whose career options, if any, were largely limited to three main categories: choose the profession, choose a scientist partner, or luck into being born to the right family.

Read Doel's full article "Assessing the status of women in physics in the 1970s" at

https://www.aip.org/history/status-women-physics-1970s

The AAS convened a Special Committee in 1972 to review the status of women in astronomy. This committee published a report in 1973 recommending the formation of the Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy, which was formalized in 1979. Read about the history of the CSWA at

https://aas.org/comms/cswa/history

Crosspost: Preserving the History of Women’s Activism in Science

This week's crosspost is from Jörg Matthias Determann, who teaches history at Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar. He is the author of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Astronomy: A Modern History (Springer, 2023). 

Within days of Donald Trump’s inauguration as 47th President of the United States in January 2025, a federal webpage of the Vera C. Rubin Observatory changed history. A section of Rubin’s biography entitled “She advocated for women in science” suddenly disappeared and then reappeared in a stripped-down form. The altered text sought to downplay, if not hide, that Rubin was an activist as well as scientist. Also gone was the observatory’s page on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). 

Read more of Preserving the History of Women's Activism in Science: https://cshps.ca/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Communique20242025No107finalfinal.html#h.yivlgc8e9g5p

This article was first published in Communiqué, Issue #107. 2024 – 2025.

Read Jörg Matthias Determann's career profile interview from 2024 with the CSWA and an interview with the CSWA about his book, "Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Astroomy: A Modern History. 

Vera Rubin (second to left) among fellow scientists Anne Kinney, Nancy Grace Roman and Kerri Cahoy at the conference Women in Astronomy and Space Science 2009: Meeting the Challenges of an Increasingly Diverse Workforce in College Park, Maryland (courtesy of Meg Urry.)