Putting Women in STEM on a Pedestal– I deeply admire my female friends at Connecticut College who are STEM majors, and I love that they are among the women who are breaking the glass ceiling of male-dominated career paths. However, I often find myself comparing my work to theirs and undervaluing the work I do as an English and Human Development double major. I think like this because my work is seen by society as not as impressive. Our society holds primarily male fields as the most prestigious just because they are associated with maleness.
Women Are Told the Only Way to Gain Respect is to Act Like Men– According to Kayla Vokolek on Medium, an online community of women sharing their life experiences, “in many ways, women are expected to adopt forms of masculinity to get ahead and be taken seriously—to be more domineering” (Vokolek). Respect often comes with the exhibition of traditionally male traits and the absence of traditionally female ones. Women in male dominated fields are often only respected when they leave behind feminine traits such as being in tune with their emotions and being empathetic to the emotions of others. Many women in STEM are expected to act like men to get ahead in their fields and women who pursue other fields have their work undervalued because their work is aided by feminine traits rather than masculine ones.Â
The Undermined Power of Traditionally Feminine Careers– I know that in reality, the kinds of fields I want to go into are incredibly impressive. The career path on the top of my list is to be a teacher. This is a path where the traditionally feminine qualities of being caring, understanding, thoughtful, and empathetic help teachers make lasting positive impacts on the self-esteem, self-concept, and forthcoming self-actualization of students. I’m so thankful for all the amazing teachers I’ve had throughout my life and I know that their support, encouragement, and care played huge factors into shaping me into the kind of person I am today. The skill required to be a teacher is often undermined by narratives that all “women are natural caregivers and so all women would be good teachers”. I’m sure if most people worked hard enough, they could be a good teacher or engineer, but both careers are certainly not easy and both professions should be respected for the work ethic required to go into them. We wouldn’t have engineers if we didn’t have teachers. Both jobs are crucial to making the world run.
The Sad Undertones of “Father Figure” by Taylor Swift– In her 2025 album, The Life of a Showgirl, Taylor Swift included a song titled “Father Figure”. The song is speculated by fans to be about her previous music manager, Scooter Braun, who Taylor Swift has claimed unfairly acquired the rights to her music. This song compares Scooter Braun to a “Father Figure”, revealing that while the two of them were supposed to work together, Taylor Swift felt like there was a huge power imbalance in the work relationship. This song is written from the first person which I interpret as a dual point of view, one from Scooter Braun and the other from Taylor Swift who is now acquiring these male, domineering traits that he exhibited to her in their work relationship. This song is supposed to be somewhat empowering because Taylor Swift won in the end by winning back the rights to her music, but has an undertone of sadness because she was treated unjustly and then felt like she had to exhibit more masculine traits in order to undo what was done to her.
Changing the Discourse– I want to be a teacher and I’m proud of that. My mom was a teacher and she is by far the most resilient, smart, thoughtful, and caring person I know. Additionally, being a mother and caregiver to children has connotations that deem it as a natural role for women rather than viewing it as an impressive achievement to be a good mother. My mom has been there for me through every step of my life and is the wisest woman I know. I will forever be grateful for the work she put in for me. Additionally, other forms of domestic work are significantly undervalued. Women of color largely hold domestic labor roles such as housekeeping and nannying and should be respected for the work they do, but a racist and sexist society does not place value on this work. The discourse around all traditionally feminine jobs needs to change from natural, expected, and unimpressive to respected, impressive, and valued. Our domestic workers, teachers, nurses, secretaries, and mothers make the world go round.Â
Source: https://medium.com/the-virago/rethinking-womens-professions-199918466d79