THE onset of October has come with great joy for scientific community and women scientists in particular. As the rounds of announcements continue for other categories, the Physics, and Physiology and Medicine categories have seen women scientists. Anne L’Huillier of France is sharing the Nobel for Physics with Pierre Agostini , and Ferenc Krausz for experimental methods that generate attosecond pulses of light for the study of electron dynamics in matter”, while Katalin Karikó of Hungary shares her Nobel Prize with Drew Weissman, for Physiology and Medicine with for their work on mRNA vaccines against COVID-19. While announcements of the other awards continue till 9th of the month, October has already established itself as a great month for women in science. Since 1902, Nobel prizes have been awarded to women 61 times, including two Prizes for Chemistry and Physics going to Madame Marie Curie Alone.
However, these awards include awards for literature, peace and economic sciences, accounting for only 26 women receiving Nobel Prizes in Chemistry, Physics and Physiology and Medicine. A deeper look further highlights the cross-sectionality of these prizes. Considering the cream of cream getting the award and that the world’s heading gradually and slowly towards more cerebral opportunities for women over a period of around 12 decades one may want to acknowledge the rise, albeit slow, in the number of women being recognized for excellence in science. Nevertheless, glass ceilings have been broken and expectations surpassed by the women scientists in the North. Surely, the well-known scientific journal, Nature, while rejecting her paper with its ‘incremental contribution’ in 2021 was not expecting Karikó to bag a Nobel Prize in 2023. Fun fact: ‘Woman Scientist’ would seem like a redundant expression if it were a common knowledge that the word ‘Scientist’ was in fact coined in 19th century to accommodate the Victorian polymath Mary Somerville, who did not fit in the then known male dominated. It’s no secret that Pakistan ranks low and in some cases at the tail end of important global indices and rankings related to science, technology and innovation, especially those including gender parity. Pakistan ranks 87 (out of 132, 108 in terms of Women Employment) under Global Innovation Index- 2022; 142 (out of 146) under Gender Gap Index 2023; and 161 (out of 192), under Human Development Index 2021-22. Even if top-performance is not expected of the country in SDGs achievement owing to its overall world rankings, Pakistan’s ranking (129) in the region also remains below its neighboring countries, India and Bangladesh, standing at 120, and 109, respectively. The Goals have integrated elements of inclusion and gender parity that surely have a strong bearing on their achievement. While deeper comparatives between Pakistan and other countries doing better on the above scales may be needed to adopt best policy making and implementation practices for integration of women in consequential scientific institutions and programmes in Pakistan, there are some aspects that are easily observable in this regard.
While a deeper legislative look at such matters is in order and may take its time, a good start for would be addressing related biases and prejudices, and indigenizing women inclusion related discussions to include more oriental contexts and debates. This is especially important to reduce antagonistic responses met by subjects related to women owing to poorly framed taglines and pitching unrealistic ideals not standing a chance to diffuse deep into the society. To avoid hard collisions that do more harm than good to such causes, a regard of societal values need to be a strong policy consideration. Interestingly enough, Pakistan is where the South and the Orient meet as set of regional imperatives and values, both real and perceived. Regardless, communication being at the heart of such policy issues, awareness needs to be raised among the masses about the prestige that this region, and Islam places on knowledge acquisition, how many sciences owe their foundation to Muslim Scientists, and that many attributes and limitations that have become characteristic of women in the region are more cultural than religious.
How many of us know that the first university of the world was founded by a woman, Fatima bint Muhammad Al-Fihriya Al-Qurashiya in 895 CE in Fez, which is now in Morocco. Success stories of excellence, such as those of Dr. Sania Nashtar with an impressive portfolio having positions held and nominated for at home and abroad need to be continuously showcased. Pakistan is full of story of caution inducing fear and inaction in the masses when it comes to women. It’s high time to highlight the role models. Azra Quraishi, Tasneem Zahra, Arfa Karim, Nergis Mavalvala, Asifa Akhter, Hibah Rehmani are some names that need to be celebrated to motivate girls in pursuing sciences in education and career. The fact that many of these reaching leadership positions and prominence are expatriates seem to indicates need for attention towards harnessing scientific leadership capacity in women in Pakistan. Nevertheless, based on these examples and many other brilliant women in Pakistan the future is bright for women and girls in Pakistani science, and it is exciting to see what they accomplish in the years to come. Investigation into attrition from early education to science leadership in context could be a useful policy research area that could help fill in the gaps. Meanwhile, matters should remain open to open-minded and progressive discussions. The news of women being recognized for scientific excellence anywhere in the world is a good one for everyone around the world, showing a global and historical intellectual growth and clichés and barriers broken and ensuing socio-economic benefits. It is also a time to take stock of matters at home, recognizing gaps and identifying possibilities of bridging them. With right socio-cultural and policy interventions, Pakistani women are capable of achieving prowess in STEM fields needed for putting the country on the map for scientific excellence, and even aiming for the moon alongside the able men of science of the country.
—The writer is contributing columnist, based in Islamabad.
