- Women engineers have been in the public limelight tor decades. Yet we have surprisingly little historically grounded understanding of the patterns of employment and education of women in engineering. Most studies are either policy papers or limited to statistical analyses. Moreover, the scant historical research so far available emphasizes the individual, single, and unique character of those women working in engineering, often using anecdotal evidence but ignoring larger issues like the patterns of the labor market and educational institutions. Richly illustrated, Crossing Boundaries, Building Bridges offers answers to the question why women engineers have been required special permits to pass through the male guarded gates of engineering and examines how they have managed this. It examines the differences and similarities between women engineers in nine countries from a gender point of view. Through case studies the book explores the mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion of women engineers from educational institutions and labor markets as well as the role of the state, the women's movement, large corporations, and family firms in the process, offering a comprehensive and historically grounded analysis of women in one of the most male dominated professions.
- This is comparative scholarship at its best: detailed case studies rooted
in national cultural contexts that, taken together, provide striking insight
into the history of women in the quintessentially masculine field of engineering.
Joan W. Scott, Professor at the lnstitute for Advanced Study. Princeton
University, Princeton, N.J., USA.
- This hook provides vivid documentation on why and how women must be
equal partners in the world of engineering.
Paula M. Rayman, Professor and o;rector of the Radcliffe Public Policy
Institute, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
These elegant essays meet a vital need by providing insights into how
gender has influenced the development of engineering
Karin Hausen, Professor of History and Director of the Center tor Interdisciplinary
. Women's and Gender Studies, Technical University, Berlin, Germany
- A major fascinating contribution to the contemporary history of gender
in its relations with education, knowledge, and profession as an ongoing
social process, as a form of history-in-the-making.
Michelle Perrot, Professor of History at the University of Paris Vl
France.
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| 'Crossing Boundaries, Building Bridges Comparing the History of Women engineers 1870- 1990' Edited by Annie Canel, Ruth Oldenziel and Karin Zachmann |
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