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ERIC Number: ED449994
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 2001-Feb-1
Pages: 45
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
Rethinking "Authentic" Science Learning: Context, Agency and Feminist Science in the Case of a Reform-Minded Biology Department.
Buxton, Cory A.
This study explores how science and scientists were produced and reproduced within the setting of a university biology department. Building upon recent work in anthropology of education and feminist science studies, the study explored the reflexive questions of whether increased women's representation in science changed science practice and whether changing science practice increased women's representation in science. It examined both the contextual and constitutive values of science as they were negotiated and played out in the training of scientists for this setting. The research found some ways in which these values were shifting as more women assumed places of leadership in the department. At the same time, it identified other ways in which the presence of women did not seem to cause the types of changes that feminist science studies have hypothesized. In terms of changing practices leading to changing representation, the study again found some evidence to support this assertion and other evidence that this might not always be the case. These findings can be interpreted through the anthropological perspective of practice theory, where individuals are seen as exerting agency both within and against institutional structures. (Contains 46 references.) (Author/SAH)
Publication Type: Reports - Research; Speeches/Meeting Papers
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A