40 Women Academics Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

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, 198 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 46 of the 198 new members of the AAAS are women. Thus, women make up only 23.2 percent of the new members of the academy. This is down slightly from a year ago.

It appears that 40 of the 46 new women members have ties to academia.

(L to R) Top row: Carmen C. Bambach, Bonnie Bartel, Cynthia M. Beall, Shelley L. Berger, Xandra Owens Breakefield, Martha Constantine-Paton, Janice Caryl Eberly, and Susan J. Eggers. Second row: Donna M. Ferriero, Paula Fredriksen, Alison Gopnik, Paula T. Hammond, Frances Hellman, Christine Jolls, Louise Helen Kellogg, and Nancy Knowlton. Third row: Rae Langton, Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Virginia Man-Yee Lee, Naomi Ehrich Leonard, Susan Mann, Susan Marqusee, Sarah Crawford Maza, and Rose M. McDermott. Fourth row: Judy Pfaff, Suzanne Ruth Pfeffer, Karin M. Rabe, Lauren B. Resnick, Jennifer Rexford, Pamela Samuelson, Geraldine Seydoux, and Ann Swidler. Bottom row: Natasha Trethewey, Barbara G. Tversky, Sandra L. Vehrencamp, Renata M.M. Wentzcovitch, Phyllis M. Wise, Kathryn Ann Woolard, Bin Yu, and Xiaowei Zhuang.

• Carmen C. Bambach is curator of the department of drawings and prints at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
• Bonnie Bartel is the Ralph and Dorothy Looney Professor of Biochemistry and Cell Biology at Rice University in Houston, Texas.
• Cynthia M. Beall is the Distinguished University Professor of Anthropology at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio.
• Shelley L. Berger is the Daniel S. Och University Professor of Cell and Developmental Biology at the University of Pennsylvania.
• Xandra Owens Breakefield is a professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School.
• Martha Constantine-Paton is an investigator at the McGovern Institute for Brain Research and a professor of biology, brain and cognitive sciences, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
• Janice Caryl Eberly is the assistant secretary for economic policy & chief economist for the United States Department of the Treasury. She is on leave as the James R. and Helen D. Russell Professor of Finance at Northwestern University.
• Susan J. Eggers is the Microsoft Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, Emerita at the University of Washington.
• Donna M. Ferriero is a professor of pediatrics and neurology at the University of California, San Francisco.
• Paula Fredriksen is the Aurelio Professor of Scripture Emerita at Boston University.
• Alison Gopnik is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley.
• Paula T. Hammond is the David H. Koch Professor in Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
• Frances Hellman is a professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley.
• Christine Jolls is the Gordon Bradford Tweedy Professor of Law and Organization at Yale Law School.
• Louise Helen Kellogg is professor of geophysics at the University of California, Davis.
• Nancy Knowlton, holds the Sant Chair in Marine Science at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington.
• Rae Langton is a professor of philosophy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
• Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot is the Emily Hargroves Fisher Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
• Virginia Man-Yee Lee is the director of the Center for Neurodegenerative Disease Research and the John H. Ware 3rd Professor in Alzheimer’s Research, and professor of pathology and laboratory medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
• Naomi Ehrich Leonard is the Edwin S. Wilsey Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Princeton University in New Jersey.
• Susan Mann is a professor of history emerita at the University of California, Davis.
• Susan Marqusee is a professor of biochemistry, biophysics and structural biology at the University of California, Berkeley.
• Sarah Crawford Maza is the Jane Long Professor in Arts and Sciences and the Director of the Nicholas D. Chabraja Center for Historical Studies at Northwestern University.
• Rose M. McDermott is a professor of political science at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.
• Judy Pfaff is the Richard B. Fisher Professor in the Arts and co-director of the Studio Arts Program at Bard College in New York.
• Suzanne Ruth Pfeffer is the Emma Pfeiffer Merner Professor of Medical Sciences and professor of biochemistry at the Stanford School of Medicine.
• Karin M. Rabe is a professor of physics at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
• Lauren B. Resnick is a University Professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science at the University of Pittsburgh.
• Jennifer Rexford is the Gordon Y. S. Wu Professor in Engineering at Princeton University.
• Pamela Samuelson is the Richard M. Sherman Distinguished Professor of Law and professor of information at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law.
• Geraldine Seydoux is an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and professor of molecular biology and genetics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
• Ann Swidler is a professor of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley.
• Natasha Trethewey is the Poet Laureate of the United States and the Robert W. Woodruff Professor of English and Creative Writing and holds the Phillis Wheatley Distinguished Chair in Poetry at Emory University in Atlanta.
• Barbara G. Tversky is a professor of psychology and education at Columbia University.
• Sandra L. Vehrencamp is a professor emerita of neurobiology and behavior at the Laboratory of Ornithology of Cornell University.
• Renata M.M. Wentzcovitch is a professor of chemical engineering and materials science at the University of Minnesota.
• Phyllis M. Wise is the chancellor of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
• Kathryn Ann Woolard is a professor of anthropology at the University of California, San Diego.
• Bin Yu is a Chancellor’s Professor, professor of statistics and professor of electrical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley.
• Xiaowei Zhuang is a professor of chemistry and chemical biology and a professor of physics at Harvard University.