Event

Tuesday 10 February, 19:00 h

In first person: the voice of women researchers

ICREA-CCCB Debates

Only twenty per cent of Europe’s professorships with the highest endowments are occupied by women, and the statistics are similar for all institutions related with high-level academic research. Debate on the issue of women in science is therefore inescapable. While there may be general agreement concerning the need for more women to be engaged in science and research, obstacles appear when it comes to solving the problem. Reconciling working life and family life, the unequal presence of women depending on the academic discipline, and implicit bias in the predisposition towards a less positive assessment of the work done by women are some of the key issues to be discussed when inquiring into this situation. Moreover, a greater presence of women scientists is an improvement which would, perforce, have an impact on the quality of research being done today, and on society as a whole: incorporating women’s ways of doing things, working and analysing is a contribution that could contribute towards broadening and enriching our knowledge of the world and also an essential step if we are to achieve a more egalitarian society.

This cycle of debates aims to highlight all these questions, present their ramifications, and ask whether there are short- or long-term solutions. “Women and Science” is the fifth of the jointly organised ICREA-CCCB Debates, a regularly occurring endeavour which aims to inform the general public of the advances being made and challenges facing top-ranking scientists currently working in Catalonia.

 

DEBATE WITH:

Louise McNally, Professor of Linguistics at the Pompeu Fabra University and winner of the ICREA “Acadèmia” award in 2009 and 2014.

Pepa Toribio, ICREA Research Professor in the Philosophy Department at the University of Barcelona and president of the Spanish Society for Analytic Philosophy.

Verònica Benet, ICREA Research Professor in the Department of Political and Social Sciences at the Pompeu Fabra University and head of the research group BESS (Behavioral and Experimental Social Sciences)

Mara Dierssen, neurobiologist, research director at the Centre for Genomic Regulation of Barcelona and president of the Spanish Society for Neuroscience.

Presented by Josep Maria Antó Boqué, Professor of Medicine at the Pompeu Fabra University and director of the Centre for Environmental Epidemiology Research.

Credits

Organizer
Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, ICREA
With the collaboration of
Ara.cat