Faculty women: making our mark

The reality of discrimination within the university system has been recognised by, for example, the Committee of Vice Chancellors and Principals in the UK (CVCP, 1991), and the President of MIT in the US (MIT, 1999). In a classic article, Acker (1980) suggested that wage differences were only one indicator of the reality of such discrimination. She highlighted three ‘subtle problems’ faced by women academics: firstly, their relative powerlessness as minorities within academia; secondly, male domination of knowledge, and thirdly, the conflicting demands of greedy institutions, (viz. work and family). More recently, it was still being noted that: ‘A conscious effort needed to be made by academic institutions to address the underlying structures and systems, which disadvantage women’ (European Commission, 2000, p.30). Typically, however, even if this is recognised, it is seen as a ‘woman’s problem’ rather than one arising from the nature of academia itself or from wider socially created disjunctions (Beck, 1992). Issues surrounding women’s position in the academy have been raised in the Republic of Ireland (subsequently referred to as Ireland) since the 1980s (Smyth, 1984; HEA 1987). Indeed, Ruane and Dobson (1990) showed that, controlling for academic discipline, qualifications, research output, teaching, administrative experience and career breaks (some of which could in fact also be regarded as indicators of discrimination), Irish women academics were still paid 10 per cent less than their male counterparts.