Date: Sat, 21 Jun 1997 01:17:53 -0400
From: Thomas F Brown <tombrown@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu>
Subject: Re:  hiring
To: socgrad@csf.colorado.edu
Message-id: <97Jun21.011759edt.547-1@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu>
Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
>Hold on--are you suggesting that "gendered social interactions" are
>uniform from one institutional setting to the next?  I think her point is
>in demonstrating how gender as a systematic pattern of social relations
>is organized in one particular institutional setting--academic sociology.

I understand what she was trying to demonstrate. My point is that she failed
to demonstrate it. Any of her examples could have occured in any professional
setting. None of them constitute tracking certain students into certain
specialties. They're just examples of gendered interactions. And while such
interactions may be different in different institutional settings, the
examples she offered did not demonstrate anything unique to academic sociology.

>I'm also troubled by your response to this scenario:
>
>> >given professor invited a male graduate student to his home to work on an
>> >NSF application.  Apparently, they stayed up really late crafting the
>> >application carefully, etc.  When one of his women advisees was applying
>> >for a grant, however, time to work on her application was relegated to
>> >office hours at the University.  When confronted with this difference, he
>> 
>> This guy was probably afraid of a sexual harassment rap. I can certainly see
>> how this would constitute differential or even discriminatory treatment
>> according to gender, but it's a function of pervasive social regulation
>> rather than anything specific to the discipline. And again, I don't see how
>> this constitutes a push into any particular specialty.
>> 
>Of course, no one is accusing him of sleeping with the male graduate
>student nor does the male graduate student recieve any flack for trying to
>win favors by spending late hours at his professors home.  Social
>regulation to be sure but in forms that are highly gendered...

The point is that this example doesn't demonstrate the existence of tracking
certain students into certain specialties, and doesn't have anything to do
with the discipline of sociology, considering that the same problem could
turn up in any professional setting.