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Speaking of Women in Ecology

March will, once again, be Women’s History Month here in the U.S.* We’ll be focusing on the many women who now work, and have worked, in ecological sciences. We would love to have your help! We’ll be posting bios of women whose contributions are significant but who may, personally, be little known outside the field of ecology, as well as those who are accomplished and well recognized by their peers.
We’ve got lots of ideas and we could use your help! If you have a favorite role model, or just want to help out, we welcome you to help compile brief biographies of women who are now working, or have in the past worked, in the ecological sciences.
Given the vast, largely unsung, contributions women have made to many fields, including ecology, we think they deserve better. Give us a hand, won’t you? (By the way, HRC is heavily weighted toward plant ecologists—we could use some help from other disciplines!)

Please volunteer to help us with:

(links are brief Microbiographies)

  • Compilation of women Mercer Award winners
  • Description of research program and intellectual contributions of award-winning and office-holding women in ESA

Or propose a project!

Places to start

Sources of information:

Need ideas for subjects to profile? Here are some great suggestions:

  • Last year, Melissa Giresi asked Twitter about the “most influential female ecologists alive today.” She came up with a list of 45.
  • In 1988, ESA past-president Jean Langenheim surveyed 55 female ecologists about their careers, producing her Past President’s Address and, in 1996, this followup paper.
  • Does your subject have a Wikipedia entry? If so, can you improve it? Many ecologists’ pages on Wikipedia are incomplete. If there’s no page, why not start one?

While there’s not a strong focus on women in science on the Women’s History Month website Women’s History Month website, they do include a a great Women in Science photo collection from the Smithsonian and Library of Congress references on African-American women in science and women and minorities in science. Unfortunately their earth and environmental sciences section doesn’t include much about women in ecology.