Paola Altomonte
A wave into the field: on the role of 20th century feminist women engaged in biological research
Department of History, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Maastricht University
Supervisors: Dr. Simone Schleper, Raf De Bont, Brigitte Le Normand
Background
I studied Philosophy (BA and MA) at the University of Bologna and History and Philosophy of Science (MSc) at Utrecht University. I’m mostly interested in understanding the history and philosophy of science from a gender and decolonial perspective. In the past, I have researched the (Italian) history of anatomy and anatomical collections, androcentrism in the history of medicine and the ethics of responsible innovation practices in the context of environmental crises.
Content
Masculinity and neutrality have been essential values in the construction of scientific imaginaries. In particular, they have been embedded in the image of the scientist, mostly at the expense of women. While the self-fashioning of women scientists within masculine science is receiving more attention, less has been paid to investigating the negotiation and strategies enacted by women scientists who were also activists. In my research, I investigate how, for women working in the natural sciences in the second half of the 20th century, who were also active in social movements, politically charged positions were not external to science nor to the building of their scientific persona. Instead, they were part of how their expertise, credibility, and public identity were constructed and continuously negotiated.
