Less Than One Fifth of the New Members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Are Women

Women have made tremendous progress in American higher education. Yet in many areas a wide gender gap remains. Election to the nation’s most prestigious honorary societies is just one example.

Founded in 1780, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS) is one of the nation’s most prestigious honorary societies. It has a membership of more than 4,000 scholars from a wide variety of academic disciplines including all the natural sciences. Its membership includes at least 200 Nobel Prize winners and more than 50 winners of a Pulitzer Prize. This year, 212 new fellows were elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Through an analysis of the list of new fellows conducted by WIAReport, it appears that 39 of the 212 new members of the AAAS are women. Thus, women make up only 18.4 percent of the new members of the academy.

Among the new women members are several academics, including:

• Frances Hamilton Arnold, Dick and Barbara Dickinson Professor of Chemical Engineering, Bioengineering, and Biochemistry at Cal Tech.

• Marsha J. Berger, Silver Professor of Computer Science and Mathematics at New York University.

• Clara Derber Bloomfield, Distinguished University Professor at Ohio State University.

• Marcetta York Darensbourg, Distinguished Professor of Chemistry at Texas A&M University.

• Penelope Dorothy Eckert, professor of linguistics at Stanford University.

• Martha Finnemore, professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University.

• Nancy Foner, Distinguished Professor of Sociology at the City University of New York.

• Sarah A. Fuller, professor of music history and theory, Stony Brook University.

• Sharon C. Glotzer, Stuart W. Churchill Collegiate Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Michigan.

• Annette Gordon-Reed, professor of law at Harvard Law School and professor of history at Harvard University.

• Jacquelyn Dowd Hall, Julia Cherry Spruill Professor of History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

• Leah H. Jamieson, John A. Edwardson Dean of the College of Engineering at Purdue University.

• Linda P.B. Katehi, professor of electrical and computer engineering, professor of women and gender studies, and chancellor at the University of California at Davis.

• Margaret Mary Mitchell, dean and professor of New Testament and early Christian literature a the University of Chicago Divinity School.

• Ellen Mosley-Thompson, Distinguished University Professor of Geography at Ohio State University.

• Ann E. Nelson, professor of physics at the University of Washington.

• Katherine S. Newman, James B. Knapp Dean of the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and professor of sociology at Johns Hopkins University.

• Monika Piazzesi, professor of economics at Stanford University.

• Roberta L. Rudnick, professor of geology at the University of Maryland.

• Deborah L. Spar, president of Barnard College.

• Gabrielle M. Spiegel, Krieger-Eisenhower Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University.

• Ann Taves, Virgil Cordano Professor of Catholic Studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara.

• Jean Yin Jen Wang, Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Biology at the University of California at San Diego.

• Sandra Robin Waxman, professor of cognitive psychology at Northwestern University.

• Barbara Weinstein, professor of history at New York University.