Lady Science no. 55

“I do wish mother had a boudoir”: Hertha Ayrton’s Home Laboratory by Emily Doucet

Also Evolving: The language of sexism in Biological Anthropology by Amanda Rossillo

“The men will not do it”: 19th-Century Sex Work and Reform by Robert Davis

For this issue, Emily Doucet explores the scientific and domestic life of engineer Hertha Ayrton and shows that for women who were denied access to scientific institutions the line between the two was not always clear. Amanda Rossillo writes about the gender biases of scientific rhetoric in biological anthropology and how that rhetoric is evolving to more accurately reflect human difference. Lastly, Robert Davis writes about 19th-century reformist women who took on the role of sociologist to study sex work, ultimately shifting the male dominated public debate from one that demonized sex workers to another that addressed structural imbalances in society.

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This issue is published in syndication with The New Inquiry.

Banner image: Woodcut of Electric Arc Lights made by Brush Electric Company Cleveland Ohio, Scientific American, 1881. Creative Commons | Wikimedia Commons.