#GAReads | Most Wikipedia Profiles Are of Men. This Scientist Is Changing That.
photo credit: Trust "Tru" Katsande, via Unsplash
“Most Wikipedia Profiles Are of Men. This Scientist Is Changing That.”:
Fewer than 20 percent of biographies on Wikipedia in English are of women, according to Women in Red, Wikipedia’s gender gap-bridging project. Jessica Wade, a British physicist troubled by that number, made it her mission to help change it.
In late 2017, she started writing biographies of women and other minorities in science and engineering. Her first addition was Kim Cobb, an American climate scientist who studies cave stalagmites and corals.
Dr. Wade’s favorite entries include the mathematician Gladys West, who was inducted into the Air Force Space and Missile Pioneers Hall of Fame; the physicist June Lindsey, who was influential in the discovery of DNA; and Ijeoma Uchegbu, known for her research in pharmaceutical nanoscience.
All in all, she has added 670 profiles so far.