Photo: Jordan McDonald/Unsplash
It was a late autumn afternoon. We were returning home after one of our fortnightly trips to the library. My about-to-be-teen daughter was immersed in the Rowling world of sorcery in the back seat of the car. The traffic was rather orderly in the chaotic heart of Delhi till we reached a busy intersection. To my surprise, I saw a vast mass of humanity, decked up in colourful attires, placards and festoons in hands, some of them singing or playing musical instruments, carrying out a procession with an abundance of gaiety. There was no possibility to penetrate the thick wall of moving women, men and… others.
I slowed down, halted and finally decided to switch off the ignition of my car. My daughter, coming out of her enchanted world of fiction, looked outside. After a brief pause, she asked me, “Who are these people, papa?”
I pondered briefly what my late father would have said, had I asked him such a question decades ago. There is no definite way of knowing that now. In one of the myriad mofussil habitats of India, very few around me had actually known about rights and equality in a formal way which is quite commonplace among the urbane populace now. Did anyone, outside the legal fraternity, have any idea about Section 377 back then?
In my zeal to sound informed, objective, just and non-judgmental to a millennial young citizen, I answered, “They are ordinary people like you and me, but they refuse to accept the binary classification of humans into two genders – female and male.” I was, perhaps, a little too technical, in my response. But the same did not elicit any further question. She soon appeared to have escaped into her favourite magical universe.
The question and my laboured response, however, remained with me.
Are scientists, who are largely objective and unbiased in decision-making in their professional work, careful enough about being respectful and non-judgemental while communicating with fellow scientists, who can’t be boxed into rigid classifications based upon various biological and social markers? It is true that scientists are also social creatures and vulnerable to biases, prejudices, superstitions and many other irrational practices prevalent in the society. But don’t we boast of being superior to others as more rational? Don’t we take credit for unravelling the mysteries of nature with objectivity and saintly detachment? Should the scientific community not come forward to herald an equitable environment, at least, in their workplaces and while interacting with other members of the community? Is it not immensely satisfying in imagining that the general public will emulate the standards set by us in, hopefully, not so distant a future?
My rumination was pleasantly interrupted when I came across an editorial of a journal published by the American Physical Society (APS). The editor in chief of the APS had called to promote “inclusive and respectful communications” among scientists in this article. It stated: “Any biases against members of the scientific community because of their race, colour, ethnicity, national origin, religion, disability, sexual orientation, gender expression, or gender identity excludes them from contributing equally to the progress of science.”
It drew specific attention towards the “correct use of pronouns”. During the review of a scientific paper, author(s), reviewer(s) and editor(s) need to communicate among themselves. Ideally all such communications should use “gender-neutral phrasing” as far as possible. It can’t, however, be denied that a gender bias in favour of the male members of the community has been quite prevalent. It is a common practice to list the email address(s) of the corresponding author(s) in the manuscript.
The APS (along with a few other publishers of research journals) now offers the authors the opportunity to include a set of pronouns which the editor(s), reviewer(s) and/or reader(s) may use while communicating with the author(s). Thus, a female author can add the pronouns “she/her/hers” and a male author has the option of adding the pronouns “he/him/his” in the manuscript. For all other authors, the suggested pronouns are “they/them/theirs”.
Note that “they/them/theirs” are gender-neutral singular third person pronouns here. Grammarians have traditionally been uncomfortable to use “they” and its related forms as singular pronouns. Such objections appear to have been surpassed now. A quick look up into the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary reveals that “they” can refer to (a) “a single person whose gender is intentionally not revealed” and (b) “a single person whose gender identity is nonbinary”, besides (c) “those ones” and (d) “people in a general way or to a group of people who are not specified”.
Further steps towards inclusion have been announced recently. A scientist, who changed their name and the preferred personal pronouns for some reason, may now update the name in their articles published prior to the change. Other leading publishers of academic journals are also working towards a more equitable environment in the world of scholarly publishing.
These efforts are, no doubt, welcome changes. But the related pitfalls are also real. Publication of research articles depends on review by peers. In the traditional single-blind peer review system, a reviewer can know or guess, in most cases, the gender of the authors through their names. The deliberate and often unconscious bias based on gender of the author(s), editor(s) and reviewer(s) may influence the decision of acceptance. However, it is not firmly established whether peer review and editorial processes contribute to the gender gap in publications of scientific articles.
A group of authors recently published in the multidisciplinary journal Science Advances a comprehensive study on possibilities of gender bias in peer review. The focus of the study was to identify probable sources of bias against women authors in the interlinked stages of submission of manuscripts, choice of reviewers by the editor, review by peer(s) and final editorial decision to accept / revise / reject the manuscript. It is hoped that the scope of such studies will be broadened to include probable bias against authors identified with non-binary genders in future. The most likely way out is, perhaps, to increase “gender diversity in editorial teams and referee pools”.
Mentioning the preferred personal pronouns in published articles is in conformity with an open and just society. However, the ideal and the real are seldom the same. How does the scientific community cope with the contradictory requirements of openness in scientific correspondence and anonymity in peer-review is something to watch out for. Like most endeavours involving humans, fairness and inclusivity in scientific communication is also a work in progress. We must always hope for a better tomorrow.
Next time my daughter asks me a question on gender equity, I will hopefully be better prepared.
Subir Nath is a nuclear physicist at Inter-University Accelerator Centre, New Delhi.