Published on Seattle Star.
This week, on 11 May 2017, a bill to decriminalize abortion in the state of New South Wales, Australia, was defeated 14 to 25. This means abortion, despite a two year legislative campaign ,remains a crime under the Criminal Act.
Continue reading The Sociology of Abortion Politics, Aussie-Style
This article was first published on Medium, 2 April 2015
Warning: analysis and spoilers for Seasons 1 to 5.
Like millions of fans around the world, I love The Walking Dead, and I’m an avid horror aficionado. Yet after five seasons, with breathtaking plot twists and turns, The Walking Dead’s treatment of gender, race and sexuality remains stagnant. For a show that takes many liberties when asking the audience to suspend disbelief, there’s one area it has no trouble maintaining a familiar narrative: the dominance of White, heterosexual men.
Since it launched, the show has focused on relationships and character development. This proved a novel way to bring horror to popular TV. Anthropologist, Professor Juan Francisco Salazar and Dr Stephen Healy, a geographer, argue that Season Five “reflects on the meaning of group solidarity in a brave new world.” The researchers demonstrate how various social science readings of the show centre on social anxiety. In their view, this most recent season was concerned with “Rick’s communitarian family.” That is, the other characters on the show who have bound together supposedly through Rick’s leadership, even when there have been long periods (notably Season 3) when Rick provided little guidance.
The show invites its audience to consider their own bravery under zombie duress. Would we panic and leave sweet Noah stuck in a revolving door swarming with zombies? Would we become “weak” within the walls of Alexandria? Should this frustrating person or that annoying character be killed? The show does not encourage us to think about why the writers persist on upholding White men as leaders, and why White women, people of colour and other minorities are notably absent from the narrative landscape.
It’s no accident that the diplomatic and inclusive leadership of Deanna (a White woman), flawed as it may be, is presented as fundamentally irrational because of its inclusive ideals. Meanwhile, Rick, a White man, is presented as the only model for viable leadership in spite of his flaws.
Kim Webster, University of Melbourne and Zuleyka Zevallos, Swinburne University of Technology
This article was originally published on The Conversation, 1 November 2016.
Barely a week passes without a media report of the suffering or tragic death of a woman at the hands of a partner. Typically, these accounts focus on the individuals involved. While important, in isolation, such a focus can belie the fact intimate partner violence is a wider social problem, obscuring both the factors contributing to it and opportunities to prevent it.
A study being launched today by Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety confirms the serious impacts of intimate partner violence. The analysis, undertaken by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, provides estimates of the impact of intimate partner violence on women’s health.
Data from the Personal Safety Survey, Australia’s most reliable violence prevalence survey, was used as a key input.
Since the age of 15, one in four women in Australia have experienced at least one incident of violence by a partner. This includes violence perpetrated by a live-in partner as well as boyfriends, girlfriends or dates. This is based on a definition of violence, used by the Personal Safety Survey, which includes physical and sexual assault, as well as face-to-face threats the victim believed were likely and able to be carried out.
When emotional abuse by a live-in partner is included, (defined as controlling behaviours aimed at causing fear or emotional harm), it is estimated one in three women have experienced violence or abuse by an intimate partner. Continue reading Study Confirms Intimate Partner Violence Leading Health Risk Factor for Women
This article was first published in DiverseScholar, on 20 April, 2015.
In my previous DiverseScholar article, I showed why the study behind The New York Times Op Ed (claiming the end of sexism) was methodologically flawed and ideologically biased [Zevallos 2014]. I showed that a focus on an individual choice narrative to explain why women are disadvantaged in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) is fundamentally unsound when understood alongside the long-standing empirical evidence from the social sciences. Here, I will review several science controversies related to the editorial and institutional decisions within STEM. These patterns show that everyday interactions contribute to gender inequality, from the use of images, to dress, to the way distinguished women scientists are described in the media. I start with a selected timeline of events highlighting gender inequality in STEM.
Continue reading Sexism in Science Reporting
On 11 November 2015, I was interviewed by Lauren Morello, for Nature. The article, ‘Science and sexism: In the eye of the Twitterstorm,’ explores how social media supports public discussion about sexism in science. Read an excerpt below.
Continue reading Interview: Science and Sexism
Published on London School of Economics Impact Blog.
Robust empirical research shows that women are less likely to be hired for STEM jobs, as well as promoted, remunerated and professionally recognised in every respect of academic life. Earlier this month, however, a widely reported study suggested gender bias is largely a myth. Zuleyka Zevallos evaluates the study and argues it fails to simulate the conditions in which hiring decisions are made. The process of hiring any professional is the outcome of social interaction. Biases shape social exchanges.
Continue reading The Myth About Women in Science? Bias at Work in the Study of Gender Inequality in STEM
On 6 February 2015, my research with my colleagues was featured in an article by Brigid Schulte for The Washington Post.
Continue reading Interview: Black and Latina Women Scientists Sometimes Mistaken for Janitors
On 3 December 2014, I was interviewed by Stephanie Pappas, for Live Science. The article, ‘Wikipedia’s Gender Problem Gets a Closer Look,’ looks at sexism in Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation reports that only 10% of Wikipedia editors are women. Read an exercept below.
Continue reading Interview: Wikipedia’s Gender Problem Gets a Closer Look
Over the past couple of months, I have been using sociology to show how everyday experiences of sexism and racism feed into the educational and career trajectories of women and minorities in various disciplines within Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). Here I include summaries of my writing from recent times, which show how social policy can dramatically impact on women’s educational outcomes. I’ve also covered how childhood socialisation impacts on girls’ transition from school to university. Experiences in higher education are also gendered, that is, culture shapes how women and men think about what happens to them at university. We see this clearly in relationships with thesis supervisors and informal socialising, as well as in more formal processes in administration. I’ve also highlighted some progress in diversity, namely the appointment of a lesbian technology expert, Megan Smith, who now holds a key role with the American government. Despite this achievement, various controversies in STEM related to social media use by scientists, research on women and high profile science events signify that despite strides forward, women and minorities are still the targets of inequality and marginalisation.
Continue reading Sociology of Gender and Diversity in Science
04 November 2014, I was interviewed by Rebecca Schuman, for Slate. The article, ‘Don’t Worry Your Pretty Little Heads. A New York Times Op-ed Trolls the Academic Science Community,’ covers a recent New York Times op-ed, which argues that ‘Academic Science Isn’t Sexist.’ Below is an excerpt.
Continue reading Interview: Don’t Worry Your Pretty Little Heads
I had always planned to use this website to collate my various writing and social media, to have them all in one place. I’ll now bring you a weekly update on my current writing as well as a look at past posts from my different blogs and communities. I’ll organise the articles based on themes. This week is focused on my sociological writing about women’s issues. First, an overview on what I’ve been writing lately.
Over on my research blog, The Other Sociologist, I’ve written about How Media Hype Hurts Public Knowledge of Science. I discuss how scientists can better support public education by critiquing poor science reporting in the news. A recent example involved the media reporting that most people think that astrology is a science. This “factoid” came from a large study by the American National Science Foundation, but the results were quoted out of context and needed scientific critique. The broader study actually shows that the public do not really understand what scientists do, how our research is funded and the outputs of our work. This lack of knowledge undermines the public’s general understanding and trust in science. I argued that more scientists can get involved in diverse outreach activities to support public learning. This is part of a long-standing series I’ve been writing on how to improve public science education. Read more my blog.
On Sociology at Work, I talked about How Sociology Class Discussions Benefit Your Career. I used this post to highlight how the group work we do during an undergraduate degree trains students for the types of activities they’ll carry out as applied researchers outside academia. This includes dealing with clients, running community consultations and thinking critically on our feet. Learn more.
The rest of this post is about my most recent writing on gender equality in business and in science and technology. Enjoy! Continue reading Sociology for Women
Dr Zuleyka Zevallos - Sociology Prose 