WOMEN IN PHYSICS? IDENTITY AND DISCOURSE IN TAIWAN by LI-LING TSAI B.Sc, National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan, 1988 M.Sc, National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan, 1990 M. A., National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan, 1998 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES (Department of Curriculum Studies) We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA January 2004 © Li-Ling Tsai, 2004 Abstract This dissertation argues that the deeply held hope for gender equity in science can no longer be simply realized as a project to increase women's participation in science. Understanding women's vexed relations with science requires a reconceptualization of the terms women and science, not as given categories to signal how "women" are coping with their disadvantaged positions in "science," but rather as two discourses formed in relation to each other, in institutional practices and in particular social and historical contexts. This dissertation investigates discourses of women and science by focusing on women in physics in Taiwan. This focus extends debates about gender and science by showing that the intervention of a particular discourse—in this case, the discourse of "women in physics"— into an existing discursive field exposed the contested terrain of the gender politics of physics and the identity politics of women physicists in Taiwan. "Women in physics" emerged as an internationally legitimate subject position in Taiwan in 1999 following a call to form a local working team on women in physics. The participants I interviewed utilized this internationally legitimate subject position to reconstruct, in different ways, their gendered identities in physics. Scholarship in the field of gender and science education studies has, over the past three decades, focused on equity and inclusion to address gender inequalities in science. This dissertation suggests, by contrast, that a focus on identity is necessary for understanding gendered career decisions in science. The term identity refers to how individuals perceive themselves and how others respond to their claims; identity involves the purposes, interests and contexts of particular naming processes. In the structural inequalities of gender and science, a focus on identity aims to track individual and collective forms of agency exercised in changing discursive fields. This dissertation concludes by viewing curriculum as a discursive field where various discourses provide subject positions and produce potential meanings through teaching and learning. Hope for social transformation can be situated in the interventionary power of new discourses and the subsequent reconfiguration of gendered identities in existing institutional practices. Table of Contents Abstract ii Table of Contents iii List of Tables vii List of Figures viii Acknowledgments ix CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER 2: FROM EQUITY TO IDENTITY 10 Feminist Reflections on the Sciences 11 The Problems with Positivist Science 11 Debating Feminist Science(s) 17 Other Strategies 21 Gender Issues in Science Teaching and Learning 22 Factor Search: The Deficit Model and the Inferior Treatment Model 22 Remedy Search: Remedies to Ameliorate Gender Inequity in Science Education 26 Gender Inclusive Science and Its Poststructuralist Turn 29 Gender Inclusive Science 29 Some Problems and the Poststructuralist Turn 31 Toward Feminist Poststructuralist Identity Questions 33 How Identity Issues Matter in Science Education 34 Identity and Learning 34 Identity and Learning of Science 35 Gender Identity and Science Education 37 Identity, Discourse, and Agency in Science Education 38 From Equity to Identity 40 CHAPTER 3: THEORIES OF DISCOURSE, IDENTITY, AGENCY 45 Theories of Discourse and Subject , 45 Discourse 45 Discourse and Ideology 47 Subjectivity, Subjection, Subject, and Identity 50 Subjectification and Resistance 53 iv Feminist Interpretations of Identity With Agency 56 Agency and Feminist Application of Discourse Theories 56 Identity and Agency Informed by Historicality and Practicality 63 Identities as Self-Authoring in Narratives 67 Applications to Women in Physics 69 CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH BACKGROUND, CONTEXT, METHODS AND WRITING OTHERS 72 Research Background ..73 Leaks in Physics 73 Under-Representation and the Leaky Pipeline 74 Variations in Different Countries 77 Research Context 79 Interpretations and Myself 79 The Working Team on Women in Physics (WTWIP) 80 Why Taiwan? 82 Research Methods 84 In-Depth Interviews and Participatory Observation 84 Participants Highlighted 86 Autoethnography and Writing Others 88 Autoethnography 89 Who Is Writing (Authoring)? 91 CHAPTER 5: THE PHYSICS DISCOURSE 93 Cartesian Reductionism and Women's Position in Physics 93 Reductionism as the Basis of Physics 93 Marginalizing Women in the Name of Reductionism 96 Women's Position in the Discipline of Physics 98 The Physicists of Abstraction and the Women of Relationality? 100 Elite Pedagogy and the Reproduction of Physicists 103 Physics for the Smartest 103 Streaming Down the Less Smart 105 Who Become Future Physicists? 106 Perpetuating Physics as the Hardest Science 109 Physics as A Discourse Ill V CHAPTER 6: THE OTHERED WOMEN WHO OTHER 114 Theoretical Underpinning 114 Subject Positions for "Women in Physics" 114 Stereotyping for Othering 116 The Uppercase and the Lowercase 118 The "Women" Amongst Physicists ...121 Femininity 121 Motherhood 125 Sexuality 129 Attire 133 Women the o/Othered—Male Normalcy in Physics 137 The "Physicists" Amongst Women 138 Nu-Jong-Hau-Jieh 138 The Hard Route 140 We Can Never Go Back 141 The Women Who o/Other—The Cognitive Superiority of Physics 143 What Does It Mean to be A "Woman in Physics"—Identity Politics 144 Disruptive Potential Matters 144 Affirmative versus Transformative 145 Identity for Transformation 147 CHAPTER 7: ORGANIZING A WOMEN'S GROUP IN PHYSICS 149 Challenges from Within 150 Qualifications of the Leader 150 Reinforcing the Hierarchical Power Structure of Physics 152 Challenges from Other Women Physicists 155 Commanding Presence versus Trustful Sharing 155 Betraying the Image of "Chinese" Women 158 Is Gender a Legitimate Topic in Physics? 161 Generational Difference and the Feminist Movement in Taiwan 161 Relations with "Feminist" Groups 164 Challenges from Men • 165 Their Hurt Feelings 165 Problems "Out There"? 167 Problems "in" the Department 170 Field of Negotiability 172 CHAPTER 8: IDENTITY RECONSTRUCTION WITHIN DISCOURSES 175 Identity Reconstruction of Women in Physics 176 Three Women Physicists and Four Competing Discourses 176 Jing: Don't Single Me Out as a "Women in Physics" 179 Hong: Maybe I'll Stay for Future of Women in Physics 183 Kim: We are Responsible for the Word "Feminism" 187 The Availability of Various Discourses including an Interventionist Discourse 189 Negotiability and Empowerment 191 CHPATER 9: CONCLUSION 195 REFERENCES 205 vii List of Tables Table 1. Degrees awarded to Women in Physics and Women as Physics Faculty (%) 79 Table 2. Information on Highlighted Participants 87 vm List of Figures Figure 1& 2. The low participation rates of women in physics in the US 74 Acknowledgements This dissertation would be impossible without the group of women in physics in Taiwan, whose true names I must keep confidential, and whose generosity and patience with me has characterized my working relationship with them and provided the substance of this dissertation. I give my primary acknowledgement to their participation in my research while I claim sole responsibility for how they have been represented in this ethnography. Then it is Dr. Jim Gaskell, my supervisor, to whom I cannot address enough gratitude. The four-and-a-half year journey I took with him has been one of passionate adventures, thoughtful guidance, affectionate care and trustful sharing. Jim is such a wonderful mentor as well as a dear friend. It is almost sad to recognize that his supervisorship with me has come to an end. At this moment, I cannot fully describe my feelings but present him this thank-you from the depths of my heart. I will also carry on the kindness and care he planted in me for my next journey. My research committee members Dr. Mona Gleason and Dr. Elvi Whittaker have been extremely supportive from the beginning of my research. It is amazing that Mona seemed to be always available whenever I posed an intellectual inquiry or an administrative request to her. She made sure that I promptly received the kind of support I had hoped to gain. Elvi has generously taken me into her schedule even after her retirement and coached me through this process from beginning to end. Without her prudence, my project would be one of flaws. Many individuals have offered their tremendous friendship and intellectual exchange throughout my program. I cannot list all but only name a few: Janet Lai, Erika Evasdottir, Alfred Ojelel, Mathabo Tsepa, Shiho Maeshima, Jill Carrick, Zeynep Kezer and Sandy Suardi. The company and assistance of Chia-Chun Hsieh, Heng Ju and Pai Xu was crucial to the concluding of my program. Jean and Larry Lai have offered me a quasi-family during my stay in Vancouver. Shu-Mei Yang, Kathy Lin and Ginny Lin were especially important friends who upheld me through those particular difficulties. As for Chun-Chieh Chi and Guy Beauregard, the encouragement and challenges I received from them have marked the vicissitudes of my doctoral program at UBC. X My family has constantly encouraged my academic pursuits. My parents gave me the educational resources that were unusual at a time of patriarchy; and my sister Judy takes care of me whenever I stumble. I pay my dearest thanks to their unconditional love. Finally, I wish to acknowledge several institutions. I am grateful to my school—the National University Preparatory School for Overseas Chinese Students—that granted me a study leave for four years. The financial support of the Izaak Walton Killam Fellowship and the Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation Doctoral Fellowship has been essential to the completion of this research project. 1 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION /.