Women of the Wild

Field stations and marine laboratories (FSMLs) are sentinels of Earth’s climate, providing scientists with the infrastructure to collect data in otherwise inaccessible areas of the globe. Many FSMLs were built around and continue to perpetuate male-dominated institutional ideologies, making it difficult for women, BIPOC, and those with intersecting identities to progress, succeed, and thrive. In a collaborative effort across field ecologists and communication scholars working with women navigating these spaces, this book’s priorities are to: 1) document the gender history of FSMLs; 2) provide a context for the current organizational culture and understand the current communication climate dynamics; 3) explore current barriers to leadership, success, and factors that contribute to positive communication climates in FSMLs, and 4) explore strategies, programs, and interventions for supporting women’s leadership roles, as well as, to develop best practices for policy, resource allocation, and field station design to better support and increase women’s leadership roles in FSMLs.

“"Women of the Wild is an empowering, engaging, and intellectually stimulating set of chapters that depict, with delightful and sometime heart-wrenching detail, how women who work in field stations and marine laboratories (FSMLs) persevere, improvise, manage, and relate to others and their environmental challenges. From interview and case studies to autoethnographies, the varied approaches build new knowledge about and practical strategies for handling these women's everyday experiences. Their inspirational chapters speak to the passion and resilience in human endeavors."”

"We tend to romanticize wildlife research in remote places, but that belies some serious challenges women in particular have to face in doing fieldwork. While the dangers of the wild make for thrilling and sometimes tragic tales, what we don't often hear about are the particular risks women face from predatory men. Women of the Wild is a refreshing and powerful edited volume that brings together a variety of experiences of women doing research in remote field stations and marine laboratories around the world. This collection includes research-based articles, first person accounts, and fictionalized retellings of harrowing experiences and creative responses from women who nevertheless persisted. A must read for anyone who does fieldwork, has field researchers in their life, or simply enjoys reading about adventures in the wild."

Victoria McDermott is current Ph.D. student and instructor of communication at the University of Maryland and adjunct faculty at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

Jennifer M. Gee is director of the James San Jacinto Mountains and Oasis de los Osos Reserves, field research stations that are a part of the University of California Natural Reserve System and the University of California, Riverside.

Amy R. May is assistant professor in the Department of Communication and Journalism at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

Field stations and marine laboratories (FSMLs) are sentinels of Earth's climate, providing scientists with the infrastructure to collect data in otherwise inaccessible areas of the globe. Many FSMLs were built around and continue to perpetuate male-dominated institutional ideologies, making it difficult for women, BIPOC, and those with intersecting identities to progress, succeed, and thrive. In a collaborative effort across field ecologists and communication scholars working with women navigating these spaces, this book's priorities are to: 1) document the gender history of FSMLs; 2) provide a context for the current organizational culture and understand the current communication climate dynamics; 3) explore current barriers to leadership, success, and factors that contribute to positive communication climates in FSMLs, and 4) explore strategies, programs, and interventions for supporting women's leadership roles, as well as, to develop best practices for policy, resource allocation, and field station design to better support and increase women's leadership roles in FSMLs.

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