Who Makes Geographical Knowledge? The Gender of Geography’s Gatekeepers

Abstract

Building on the insight that all knowledge is situated and embodied, we analyze the gender of gatekeepers in the production of geographical knowledge in the current Anglophone publication landscape. Our results show that the share of women gatekeepers throughout the three selected sites-handbooks, progress reports, as well as editors and editorial boards of twentytwo geography journals-is consistently between 36 and 42 percent. These averages, however, disguise widely varying figures between different handbooks and journals. Comparing data for journal editors and editorial boards between 1999 and 2017, we find considerable growth in the presence of women. We also show that a higher share of female editors is associated with a higher share of women in editorial boards and in commissioned contributions. Editors and journals therefore need to put gender equity (but also racial and language equality) among the board and among contributors squarely on the agenda to create more space for new theoretical approaches, issues, and methodologies that center the lives and experiences of those living in spaces outside of the white Anglosphere-in the Global South and the Global East but also in the Global North.

Who Counts? Gender, Gatekeeping, and Quantitative Human Geography

“…We agree, however, with Schurr, M€ uller, and Imhof's (2020) larger premise: Assessing the gender balance of core geography journals is valuable, given the gatekeeping as well as the signaling role that editorial teams provide. The spotlight that Schurr, M€ uller, and Imhof (2020) shone on their sample of journals should equally be shone on the more quantitative human geography journals, providing a benchmark of progress but also highlighting how geography as a whole is structured, with common challenges and shortcomings across the breadth of the discipline.…”

“…It certainly matters in terms of larger narratives around attracting and retaining women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields. In geography, the gender imbalance remains stark, with just over one third of faculty identifying as female (American Association of Geographers 2018) and, according to Schurr, M€ uller, and Imhof (2020), two female full professors for every seven male professors. Moreover, redressing imbalances takes time.…”

“…In a recent article in this journal, Schurr, M€ uller, and Imhof (2020) addressed how barriers-or, as they termed it, gatekeeping-at key publication junctures affect representation within the discipline of geography, notably where gender is concerned. Their analysis, which assessed the editorial makeup of edited handbooks, progress reports in Progress in Human Geography, and the editorial teams of twenty-two key generalist human geography journals and flagship publications of subdisciplines, was mainly focused on gender but also addressed internationalization.…”

“…Unlike other gatekeepers, however, publication gatekeepers, especially for journals, exercise enormous power at the institutional, disciplinary, and individual levels, controlling not only who is published but also on which topics (and in which journals), and publication, of course, is a preeminent factor in who is hired and promoted. Schurr, M€ uller, and Imhof (2020) provided a convincing argument around the roles of gatekeepers and the ongoing importance of gender, analyzing the gender balance in editorial teams of flagship geography journals. Yet they neglected the third pathway in disciplinary reproduction and gatekeeping identified earlier: how disciplinary boundaries are drawn and policed.…”

From Margin to Center? Theoretische Aufbrüche in der Geographie seit Kiel 1969

“…Was stört dich daran? Carolin Schurr: Den Kern der Geographie und dessen "reworking" definieren dabei 48 Autor_innen, alle 48 aus Anglo-Amerika, davon nur 7 Frauen (Schurr et al, 2020). Wenn man im Sinne von Donna Haraway (1988) Wissen -oder hier geographical knowledge -immer als "situiert" versteht und ernst nimmt, dass die Positionalität der Autor_innnen massgeblich die Perspektiven des Textes beeinflusst, dann finde ich einen solchen Versuch, den Kern der Disziplin festzulegen, höchst problematisch.…”