Area (1 998)30.

3,215-223

Gender, science and physical geography in

nineteent h-cent ury Britain
Cheryl McEwan
School of Geography, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2lT.
Email: c.mcewan@bham.ac.uk

Revised manuscript received 22 January 1998.

Summary This paper considers the gendered construction of science and scientific
geography in Britain during the nineteenth century. I t explores the general exclusion of
women from public, institutionalized science and their location in amateur, domestic
pursuits, whilst simultaneously problematizing this binary construction. Finally, the paper
speculates on the legacy of the past on the gendering of Contemporary physical geography.

Introduction the nineteenth century, since this was the period that
witnessed the increasing institutionalization and
In light of the recent feminist epistemological cri- discursive bounding of geography as a discipline. It
tiques of the discipline of geography and, in particu- was also the period in which physical geography
lar, geography as a social science (Blunt 1994; established itself as a valid scientific discipline. The
Domosh 1991; McDowell 1979; McDowell and paper reveals how the gendering of science in the
Peake 1990; Rose 1993;1995),it is perhaps surpris- nineteenth century effectively excluded women,
ing that physical geography is only now coming both from science in general and from those particu-
under scrutiny from feminists. The ‘pure sciences’ lar techniques and practices that loosely constituted
have been subject to critique by feminists since the physical geography in the years before the institu-
1970s, and the literature on feminist approaches tionalization of the discipline. It draws on a wide
to science has burgeoned since the late 1980s.’ range of debates about gender, science and physical
Physical geography is only now being subjected to geography during the nineteenth century, focusing
similar critiques, which both bring into question the specifically on two themes:
discursive constitution of physical geography‘ and
1 The articulation of gendered notions of ‘separate
have implications for its theoretical foundations and
spheres’ (amateur or professional, private or pub-
practices (see Bates 1997).In short, physical geogra-
lic, popular or academic) in the construction of
phy is no less removed from the politics of gender
science and scientific geography.
than any other area of the social or physical sciences.
2 The participation of women in botany and
The gendering of physical geography is scarcely
field natural science during the nineteenth
confined to abstract philosophical questions, but
century, and the relationship of both to physical
enters deep into relationships of power in the most
geography.
profoundly material of senses; revealing the implica-
tions of this is a relatively recent concern of feminist Finally, the paper speculates on how the masculinist
geographer^.^ construction of both science and scientific geogra-
This paper does not attempt to deal with these phy during the nineteenth century may have a legacy
issues in their entirety, but is rather an initial attempt for the nature and practice of contemporary physical
at exploring the gendered constructions of scientific geography (Dumayne-Peaty and Wellens 1997;
geography in Britain at a specific historical juncture. Maguire 1997).It is, perhaps, pertinent to point out
It explores the debates concerning the cultural con- that the paper deals almost exclusively with Britain
struction of science and scientific geography during and makes no attempt to generalize beyond this

ISSN 0004-0894 0 Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) 1998
 14754762, 1998, 3, Downloaded from https://rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1475-4762.1998.tb00066.x by UFRN - Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Wiley Online Library on [24/08/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
216 McEwan

specific context about the gendering of scientific denied access to the Royal Geographical Society and
geography elsewhere. Indeed, generalizations may to broader academic science; and the construction
well be futile, since, as the paper suggests, the of physical geography as a practical, field-based,
gendering of scientific geography in Britain, and the rational, objective and, later, professional science,
legacies of this for contemporary physical geogra- meant that women were deemed both incapable
phy, were a product of a particular imperial past and of contributing to and unsuitable for the practice of
a particular set of discourses about gender roles scientific geography. Despite this, the exclusion of
and the nature of scientific endeavour. women from science and scientific geography was
not total, and they came to occupy distinct spaces
within both.
Geography and science in the nineteenth
century
’Separate spheres’: the gendering of
Before discussing the gendering of science and
science and scientific geography
scientific geography in the nineteenth century, it is
appropriate to say a little about the relationship Women’s struggle to be recognized as scientists has
between science and geography at this time.4 During a long history. Popular science for middle-class
the nineteenth century, the intellectual terrain of women increased during the eighteenth century,
what is now thought of as physical geography was but so did the gap between professionalism and
greatly contested. The Kantian version of physical amateurism, high and popular science. During the
geography (a descriptive practice and therefore not a eighteenth and nineteenth century, middle-class
science in the sense in which physics and natural women often became the unpaid ’invisible assistants’
history were sciences) was swept aside by the to scientific husbands or fathers in the home, be-
Darwinian revolution, following the publication of cause they were barred from universities. Examples
The origin of species in 1859. As Holt-Jensen(1988) of such women include Ann Lee, daughter of
points out, it was primarily a group of natural scien- nurseryman-author James Lee, and illustrator of his
tists with interests in physical geography who won works; Anna Blackburne, daughter and ’companion’
academic respect for the subject in the latter half of of a wealthy natural historian, whom Erasmus Darwin
the nineteenth century. Darwinism spawned a great referred to as ’learned and ingenious’ (Shteir 1996,
period of investigation into historical geology and 53); Sarah Abbot, wife of naturalist Charles Abbot,
geomorphology. However, until the late 1880s, who worked closely (but without public credit) with
physical geography itself tended to be absorbed by her husband on his botanical projects and publi-
geophysics and geology and, although more firmly cations; and Mary Kingsley, who translated German
located within the natural sciences, continued to anthropology for her father, George (Birkett 1992).
have an uneasy relationship with science in more The public works of men were, therefore, often
general terms. It was not until the influence of the based to a certain extent on the ‘invisible’, private,
likes of Davis, Mackinder and Freshfield at the end of amateur work of women taking place in the dom-
the century that geography came to be seen as a estic realm. At this time, it was even considered
distinct scientific discipline. Despite these intellectual acceptable for such women to be involved in sci-
battles over the terrain of physical geography as an ence. However, as discussed subsequently, this
academic discipline, scientific geography was very acceptability was both partial and in accordance with
much part of science throughout the nineteenth gender ideologies of the time. Despite this, in the
century. In particular, it was fundamental to several early nineteenth century, women became more
branches of ’natural history’, including mineralogy/ involved in scientific research, and were welcomed
geology (Guntau 1996; Rudwick 1996) and the briefly into the scientific community. Only a few
imperial science of animal and plant geography women achieved professional status at this time, the
(Browne 1996a; Miller and Reill 1996). With this in most notable to the historian of geography being
mind, it is possible to consider the gendering of Mary Somerville (Phillips 1990; Benjamin 1991;
scientific geography within a broader critique of Sanderson 1973).
science at this time. It is the contention here that, as Throughout the nineteenth century, there was a
women were systematically excluded from science progressive campaign in support of education for
in general, they were also by implication excluded women. Paradoxically, this was to lead to the virtual
from the practice of scientific geography. They were exclusion of women from science towards the end

Gender, science and physical geography in nineteenth-centuryBritain 21 7
of the century. The campaign to persuade educa-
tional establishments to open their doors to (middle-
class) women meant that they were eventually
allowed to study classics, but at the expense of
science. With the progressive institutionalization of
science throughout the nineteenth century, women
were increasingly excluded. The key to this exclusion
was the construction of the amateur/professional
dichotomy and its strong association with the wider
context of the gendered construction of separate
public and private realms (Poovey 1989, 8-9). Ama-
teur science, with its association with the domestic
sphere, was open both to a minority of middle-class
women and to men, but professional science,
located in the public realm, was solely the pursuit of
men. However, as women‘s work as ’invisible assist-
ants’ demonstrates, the distinction between the two
was never as absolute as this construction suggests;
the public and private ‘spheres’ were never mutually
exclusive. Scientific production by women very often
took place in a ‘third space’ (Bhabha 1994) existing
between these supposedly separate spheres.
The laboratory was one such space, a site of
scientific endeavour of some importance, particu-
larly in geology and other areas of natural history.
The mechanical and menial nature of laboratory
science made it an acceptable hobby for women:
The operations of the laboraton/, after all, were not
dissimilar to those of the kitchen, and scrutinizing lower
forms of life through a microscope was more womanly
than vain attempts to master the complexities of Latin
and Greek. (Phillips 1990, x)
Although women were denied access to the labora-
tories of academic and learned institutions, many
middle-class women were actively encouraged to
engage in scientific pursuits in the private, domestic
laboratory. The involvement of ’leisured’ women in
practical science (as opposed to broader philosophi-
cal and metaphysical questions), especially botany,
was believed to induce modesty and reverence,
encourage domesticity and curtail flightiness; it was
a harmless hobby and a cure for depression and
boredom. Allowing intelligent women to perform
mundane tasks in the laboratory was perceived as
the ideal remedy for their restlessness and boredom
within the domestic realm. Only a few women (most
famously, George Eliot and Sara Taylor Coleridge)
received some formal instruction, and even fewer
managed, like Somerville, to translate domestic
explorations into the public world of professional
science. Between 1790 and 1830, several women
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used their private scientific pursuits to enter the
public realm of publishing, especially within botany,
but this was primarily in the production of children’s
texts (see below). The laboratory, then, was con-
structed as an extension of the domestic sphere,
where amateurish scientific endeavours were pur-
sued, despite the fact that the women themselves
did not always accept the prevailing view, and set
out to repudiate the condescension towards their
endeavours.
If women were, at certain historical junctures,
encouraged to occupy the space of the domestic
laboratory, the same cannot always be said of the
field; this has particular resonances for physical
geography and natural history. As Outram (1996,
253)’ points out, the spaces of scientific knowledge
have often determined the degree of credence given
to claims to expert knowledge. Scientific geography,
with its strong associations with natural history dur-
ing the nineteenth century, struggled to locate itself
clearly within the public, professional realm of sci-
ence. Natural history itself was at this time both a
popular hobby and a scientific and imperial endeav-
our (Norwood 1993). As discussed subsequently,
nature study became identified as peculiarly suited
to women’s domestic responsibilities. However, one
of the major restrictions on women’s participation in
physical geography during the nineteenth century
was the fact that it was often seen as a field-based
science.6 This was certainly the case with geomor-
phology and geology (although with the latter there
are also clear connections between the spaces of the
field and the laboratory: see Outram 1996). In
addition, prior to the institutionalization of geogra-
phy as an academic discipline, geographical thought
and practice were rooted in overseas exploration
and the discovery, surveying and mapping of new
territories (Driver 1992; Livingstone 1992; Hudson
1977; Said 1978). As Sparke (1996) argues, whilst
the field has been the rite de passage into the world
of ‘real‘ science, it has been paradoxically feminized,
as a seductive but wild place that must be observed,
penetrated and mastered by the geographer who, hav-
ing battled with it, revelled in it, and, in the end,
triumphantly risen above it returns to the academy his
education complete, his stature assured and his geo-
graphical self proven, definitively, his. (Sparke 1996,
212)
Fieldwork, therefore, involved the exercise of a par-
ticular kind of masculinity. The field was a theatre for
the quest, both for the personal rite de passage into

218 McEwan
manhood and for intellectual enlightenment. In this
sense, the field was constructed in militaristic terms;
it was a battlefield for personal and intellectual
struggle. This is particularly pertinent, considering
that the roots of modern, professional geography are
located in exploration and imperialism; it was from
this relationship that there emerged an image of an
exclusively masculine geography militant (Conrad
1926; Driver 1992). A powerful parallel existed
between geographical conquest and sexual con-
quest: landscapes were feminized, penetrated,
assaulted, conquered and subdued. The empire was
constructed in imperial discourse as a sexual play-
ground for European men, free of the stifling morality
of the nineteenth century, a public, masculine
domain exclusive of white women (Hyam 1990).
Not only did nineteenth-century notions of feminin-
ity and financial restrictions prohibit white women
from travelling abroad alone and engaging in explo-
ration, but the colonial governments and private
businesses also conspired to prevent their access by
refusing employment to married men (Stoler 1991).
As the spaces of empire were gendered, so the field
as a site for geographical research was constructed
simultaneously as a feminized backdrop for the
playing out of particular kinds of masculinity. The
exclusion of women from the field, therefore, was
naturalized by its construction as public space. Of
course, middle-class women did transgress these
spaces in relatively large numbers during the
nineteenth century, but very rarely as professional
scientists or geographers.
One of the major constraints facing women who
wished to study the physical sciences was their
exclusion from both formal education and the aca-
demic and professional institutions that promoted
scientific research. The construction of public and
private spheres, amateurism and professionalism,
were used to justify the ostracism of women. For
example, they were excluded from the RGS until
1913 on the basis that their sex rendered them
incapable of geographical research. They were
excluded from an institution seeking to promote
modern geography and provide an intellectual
environment for professional scientific geography on
the grounds that they were, ips0 facto, amateur^.^
When it became expedient (owing to matters of
finance, geographical education and the prestige of
the Society) to admit women Fellows in the early
twentieth century, notions of what constituted geo-
graphical knowledge were broadened. A substantial
number of those admitted in 1913 were travellers, in
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addition to scientists and teachers. It was now
accepted within the RGS, at least publicly, that such
women were producing scientific geographical
knowledge (Bell and McEwan 1996). In the broader
sciences, whilst the egalitarian Botanical Society of
London had admitted women since 1836 (and
women made up 10 per cent of the members at that
time: see Shteir 1996, 175-6), it took the Sex
Disqualification (Removal) Act of 1919 to eradicate
legal barriers barring women access to chartered
scientific societies. It was 1943 before the first
women were elected as Fellows of the Royal Society
(Mason 1992).
Where women did succeed in publishing work
that was recognized as scientific physical geography,
there were implications for the separation of their
public and private personas and the protection of
their feminine respectability. Mary Somerville was
not a geographer in the disciplinary sense, but rather
an all-round philosopher of science, publishing fhysi-
cal geography in 1848. In public activity, Somerville
complied to ideals of womanliness, but in private she
was extremely ambitious (Benjamin 1991). She dis-
tanced herself from her scientific writings in public
and strove to eliminate her gendered identity from
her work. Herschel (Benjamin 1991, 52), reviewing
On the mechanism of the heavens, wrote of the
absence of ’anything like female vanity or affecta-
tion’; ’she seems entirely to have lost sight of
herself‘. This was meant as praise. This self-denial or
masking of personal gender identity was the price
women paid for entering the public realm, of which
professional science was a part.
Towards the end of the century, the amateur/
professional, public/private dichotomies began to be
disrupted by the entrance of women into formal
teaching, but only insofar as teaching was depicted
as a ‘natural’ role for women (Poovey 1989, 15).
Women’s role in teaching was considered, particu-
larly from the 1880s onwards, as vital in promoting
and combining modern geographical knowledge
with an aesthetic appreciation of nature, imparting
the national and imperial values deemed to be of
such importance at the time (Bell 1995a). Teaching
was thus a major factor in women gaining entrance
into learned scientific institutions. The position of the
RGS in barring women admission as Fellows became
increasingly untenable in the early twentieth century,
because of the large numbers of women teaching
geography (Bell and McEwan 1996; Phillips 1990).
Of the 16 lecturers and teachers elected in 1913,
diplomas from the Oxford School of Geography

Gender, science and physical geography in nineteenth-centuryBritain 219
featured prominently among the qualifications of
most, and the role of the educationalists (eg Keltie at
the RGS, Herbertson at Oxford) was fundamental to
the recognition of the part women could play in the
dissemination of geographical knowledge. Such
women included Madeleine Fripp, a specialist on
irrigation, and Sophie Nicholls, a specialist on land-
forms in the Near East (Bell and McEwan 1996). Of
course, women had been involved in instruction in
the sciences long before they entered into the public
sphere of teaching and, in particular, their role in
encouraging an aesthetic appreciation of nature had
been perceived as part of the feminine duties of
middle-class women. This was framed very often in
the ideology of motherhood. Throughout the nine-
teenth century, women wrote botany books for
children, other women and lay audiences: for
example, Frances Rowden published A poetical
introduction to the study of botany (1801) and
Charlotte Smith published several children’s book at
beginning of the nineteenth century, as did Jane
Loudon later in the century (Schteir 1996). It was
considered the role of middle-class mothers to
give young boys elementary instruction at home,
and then hand them over to men to prepare them
for public and adult responsibilities (Schteir
1996, 149). It was only later in the century that
this general instruction in nature studies became
professionalized and formalized in schools.
Women, botany and field natural history
Field natural history was the terrain upon which
geography and botany converged. As Outram points
out:
Field naturalists, whether dominant and heroic figures
such as Alexander von Humboldt, or the less well-
known figures sent out as ‘naturalistes-voyageurs’,were
imagined by a growing public for popular science as
struggling over remote and dangerous terrains in dedi-
cated pursuit of new and strange plants and animals.
(1 996, 259)
Field geography and natural history were both, there-
fore, associated with heroic, manly endeavour, and
with imperial science. As Pratt (1992, 38) argues,
there was a close relationship between natural
history, cartography and the geographical enterprise
of naming, which were central to the emergence of
Europe’s ‘planetary consciousness’ and the construc-
tion of global-scale meaning. Travel writing, and the
observational enterprise of documenting geography,
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flora and fauna, was fundamental to this. It is no
coincidence that the participation of middle-class
British women in field natural history corresponded
with the expansion of the British empire and the
increased opportunities for travel abroad. Indeed,
botanical study was very often the legitimating
factor for women travellers’ otherwise transgressive
presence in imperial spaces8
During the nineteenth century, botany achieved
hobby status for women, once it had been wrested
from the hands of the learned Latinists. Along with
geology, interest in botany increased greatly when
women began to travel, particularly between 1830
and 1860. Despite the ‘scientization’ of botany,
which coincided with an ardent ’sexualization’ of
plants in the work of Linnaeus and Erasmus Darwin,
it became for a while the feminine science par
excellence. It was considered ’unmanly’, ’an orna-
mental branch suitable only for ladies and effeminate
youths’ (Schiebinger 1989, 241 ). It was questionable
whether able-bodied young men should pursue
botany, but because of its links with herbal healing
and gardening it was thought appropriate for women
(Browne 199613, 165). Furthermore, the garden was
perceived as an extension to the domestic sphere;
the presence of women in the garden, or even
beyond, in the British countryside, was not consid-
ered transgressive of gender norms. The rationale
given at the time for women pursuing botany was
that it encouraged young middle-class women into
the open air and taught them intellectual discipline. It
was also strongly associated with the domestic
sphere, and considered an ‘elegant home amuse-
ment’ (Shteir 1996, 35). After Linnaeus, the study of
plants seemed to require more of a focus on sexu-
ality than may have been thought desirable, but it
was still considered the least offensive of scientific
disciplines to the delicate spirit of women. The most
important caveat was that the ambitions of the
botanist should not transcend those of the amateur.
During the nineteenth century, commentators
began distinguishing between the ’botanist’ and
the ’botanophile’, between the scientist and the
enthusiast (Shteir 1996, 32). These distinctions were
also gendered, so that the botanist was male and
masculine, the botanophile usually female and
feminine.
One way in which this was reinforced was through
women’s participation in botanical drawing and
flower painting. This was part of the hidden enter-
prise of women’s work women very often illustrated
the books of fathers, husbands and brothers (Shteir
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220 McEwan

1996). As Rose (1993, 186) argues, there was an valorized in physical geography over the laboratory
assumed feminized reciprocity between artist and as the locus of 'hard' science? What are the impli-
subject, and this was also framed within the realms of cations for any differential gendering of both field-
the domestic and the amateur. However, there were based and laboratory-based research in physical
also links with travel and travel writing, and this geography?"
eventually assisted certain women in gaining access The legacy of the gendering of the field for
to the institutions of professional geography. Many contemporary physical geography is profound. Rose
of the women admitted to the RGS in 1913 were (1993) suggests that there is a continuum in
actually botanists or field naturalists; botanical obser-thoughts, words and deeds between the explorer, or
vations in the course of travel and exploration came early geographer, and contemporary geography. It
to be seen as a valid scientific endeavour, and made could be argued that fieldwork in physical geography
these women acceptable as Fellows of the RGS. is gendered in more obvious ways than in social
Indeed, the likes of Keltie and Freshfield actively science. The remoteness of the field sites and the
encouraged such women to apply for Fellowship physical exertion required to reach the often exotic
because, as members of other scientific institutions locations invokes the quest genre of the nineteenth
such as the Royal Botanical Society, they would add century. The legacy of 'militant geography' and the
prestige to the RGS (Bell and McEwan 1996). An spirit of discovery and expedition may still inflect the
interest in botany, the one area of scientific fieldworkpractice of physical geography.' Fieldwork in physi-
that women had been permitted (and often encour- cal geography often invokes images of tough hero-
aged) to enter during the nineteenth century, thus ism and masculine endeavour, and carries with it
became an important factor (along with teaching) in other expressions of masculinity, such as a drinking
the justification of women's admission to the RGS ethos (Rose 1993). It is imbued with sexual politics,
in the second decade of the twentieth century. which are articulated around such issues as the
body, fitness, clothing and movement (Warren
1988).The nature of fieldwork in physical geography
Speculations on the present
may well reinforce the gender imbalance within
The legacy for contemporary physical geography of geography by discouraging the participation of cer-
the exclusion of women from the discourses of tain women (Maguire 1997). It also takes place in a
scientific geography during the nineteenth century, wider network of social practices-the geography of
and the ways in which studies of the physical today. Those often violent, masculinist discourses
environment were constrained by dominant gender that linked science, empire and exploration now
ideologies, is a matter for conjecture. It could be underpin traditional fieldwork in geography, and
argued that gendered knowledge forms still influ- they are reflective of the gender ideologies that
ence physical geography today. More detailed inform the theory and practice of geography as a
research is required to reveal the specific areas of discipline.
physical geography in which women participate, and A male-dominated profession and the possibility
the reasons for this. The fact that these papers arose of gender-biased selection procedures have been
from a conference session convened jointly by posited as explanations for the gender disparities
WGSG and the Biogeography Research Group of in contemporary academic geography (McDowell
the RGS-IBG may be significant. Evidence clearly 1979; McDowell and Peake 1990; McKendrick
suggests that there are fewer women in physical 1996). In physical geography, the ways in which
geography than in human geography (McKendrick laboratory-based and field-based research may be
1996; Dumayne-Peaty and Wellens 1997). Evidence gendered have not been fully explored, yet they may
also suggests that many women in physical geogra- have serious implications for patterns of employ-
phy are engaged with ecological and biological ment, the nature of contracts and the success of
research (Dumayne-Peaty and Wellens 1997). A grant applications. Consideration also needs to be
number of questions remain: are biogeography and given to the part that the education system plays in
ecology commonly perceived by physical geogra- the gendering of geography and the subdisciplines of
phers as 'soft' physical geography, in contrast to physical geography. McKendrick (1996) argues that
climatology or fluvial and glacial geomorph~logy?~ Is the problem of the gender imbalance in physical
the field still constructed as the locus of 'real' geography lies not with recruitment of women from
scientific research? Does the field continue to be undergraduate to postgraduate study, but in the

Gender, science a n d physical geography in nineteenth-century Britain
numbers of women taking physical geography
degrees. This may suggest that the problem begins in
the school curriculum, is continued in selection
procedures for undergraduates, and may b e influ-
enced by the prerequisites required to specialize in
physical geography. For example, advanced math-
ematics and basic physics are required for many
climatology courses. If there is already a gender
imbalance in the school system for these subjects,
which itself may b e a legacy of the historical gen-
dered construction of science, this will have a direct
influence o n the numbers of women entering physi-
cal geography, and it may predispose women physi-
cal geographers toward those areas that do not
require prior training in the sciences. In short, more
research is required to reveal the social and gender
relations that persist within physical geography to
create the gender patterns w e see in the discipline
today.
Finally, it is also important that there is continual
questioning of the ways in which the discipline of
geography is, and has been, territorialized and
bounded, and the implications this has for those
groups left on the outside. The discourses that
territorialize contemporary geography were laid
down when geography was institutionalized in the
nineteenth century, and it i s imperative that the
legacy o f this, particularly the ways in which geo-
graphical theory and practice have been constructed
as overwhelmingly white, masculine, middle-class
and heterosexual, is continually questioned. Physical
geography is not immune from the ’sexual politics o f
geographical knowledge’ (Rose 1993, 63).
Acknowledgements
A version of this paper was presented at the BRG/WGSG
session on Gender and Natural Resources at the RGS-IBG
Annual Conference, University of Exeter, January 1997. I
am grateful to Clare Madge for initially encouraging me to
commit my disparate thoughts to paper, and to the con-
veners and participants in the session for their comments. I
would also like to thank Morag Bell, Joe Painter and three
anonymous referees for their helpful and constructive
comments on an earlier draft of this paper.
Notes
1 Early critiques examined the ’masculine bias’ in the
concepts, theories and methods of academic scientific
disciplines (Harding 1986; Keller 1985). Historians of
science have examined the contributions of women
scientists and the historically masculinist construction of
scientific endeavour (Benjamin 1991; Jordanova 1989;
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22 1
Phillips 1990; Rossiter 1982; Schiebinger 1989). Feminist
critics have explored the absence of women as a subject
of scientific research, and the lack of a feminist voice in
science (Bleier 1986; Harding 1986; 1991; Keller 1992;
Namenwirth 1986). A far more thoroughgoingchallenge
to science has followed in various strands of feminism,
particularly those that highlight how scientific concepts
and theories contain within them the historically
and culturally based notions of the legitimacy of the
subordinate status of women (Haraway 1989;
1991; Rose 1994). Despite great differences within femi-
nist critiques of science, one common strand seems to
be the insistence that science is socially and culturally
constructed, and therefore never free from gender
ideologies (Doyle McCarthy 1996; Lykke and Braidotti
1996).
I use the terms ’discursive’ and ‘discourse’ to refer to
those social practices through which the world is made
meaningful and intelligible: ‘frameworks that embrace
particular combinations of narratives, concepts, ideolo-
gies and signifying practices, each relevant to a particular
realm of social action’ (Barnes and Duncan 1992, 5).
In Britain, the WGSG initiated interest by debating
gender and physical geography at a day conference in
September 1995. In the US, Sherry1 Luzzadder-Beach
and Allison MacFarlane delivered a paper at the 1996
AAC, entitled ’The environment of gender and science:
women in physical geography’, and are currently
expanding their research on this project. There have also
been workshops in Germany on this topic.
For a more detailed discussion, see Glacken (1967)’
Livingstone (1992) and Stoddart ( 1 986).
Here she is drawing on the works of sociologists such as
Erving Coffman.
The concept of ’the field‘ has been exposed as a
profoundly gendered construct (Rose 1993; Sparke
1996), and the underpinnings of the gendered construc-
tion of ’the field’ can be traced back to the nineteenth
century and beyond. For detailed feminist discussions on
fieldwork in the social sciences, see ‘Women in the
Field’, special issue of The ProfessionalGeographer 46(1)
(1994). However, there has been little, if any, analysis of
the implications of the gendering of the field and field-
work for women practitioners of physical geography (cf
Maguire 1997 and a brief mention in Domosh 1991).
The more enlightened Royal Scottish Geographical
Society admitted women from its foundation (Bell
1995b), as did many of the provincial geographical
societies (MacKenzie 1995).
8 For example, Kingsley sometimes gave the collection of
botanical specimens as the reason why she travelled
alone to West Africa, thus positioning herself as an
‘amateur collector’, and downplaying her transgression.
9 Here, there may be resonances with primatology, one
area of science where women research in relatively large
numbers, and which has spawned some of the most
influential feminist critiques of science, but which is

222 McEwan
perceived as ‘soft‘ science in contrast to the ‘hard’
science of, for example, physics.
10 Research in the broader sciences has revealed that
there are huge numbers of women participating in
science, many of them as laboratory technicians. They
are thus located in what are seen to be the most
mundane, least prestigious and worst-paid jobs, far
removed from the end product of cutting-edge science,
whilst the research faculty of science remains over-
whelmingly white, male and middle-class (Rose 1994).
11 As late as 1968, P A Jones argued,
when we train and seek to inspire a new generation
of geographers we must by precept and by example
remind them that the great discoveries and advances
made in geography have been made by men who
went to look and think in the field. (1968, 1)
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