40 pages • 1 hour read
Hope JahrenLab Girl
Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 2016A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Key Figures
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Tools
BetaThemes
Misogyny in the Sciences
The memoir focuses on the theme of misogyny in the sciences throughout Jahren’s entire life. Even before she embarks on her career, she notes: “My desire to become a scientist was founded upon deep instinct and nothing more; I never heard a single story about a living female scientist, never met one or even saw one on television” (18). Jahren must look to her own instincts and drive in order to advance herself as a female inthis male-dominated field. Even when Jahren does begin doing significant work in the field, many men still doubt her. When she attends conferences, she is “trapped with pasty middle-aged men who regarded [her] as they would a mangy stray that had slipped through an open basement window” (129). Just because of her gender, other male scientists do not take her seriously.
In addition to the generally misogynistic attitude, Jahren also encounters more overt instances of sexism. When she works at Georgia Tech, she has to avoid a “creepy post doc” who seems “particularly menacing toward the odd female who stumbled into his orbit” (70). Because of him, Jahren has to take pains to protect himself from his unwanted advances just because she is a woman. When she is an established professor at Johns Hopkins, the head of the department will not allow her in the building after she faints during her pregnancy. He is uncomfortable with her pregnant, female body and thus does not allow her entry to the lab that she built. These experiences underscore the difficulty and injustice of being a female in the sciences.
Misogyny and Conceptions of the Female in Society
Jahren also encounters misogyny and a limited conception of femaleness outside of the lab. In her family, women are expected to get married and raise a family. Although Jahren is successful in her career, she still feels pressure to adhere to this version of femaleness. She also notices this pressure in society in general and describes a single woman as being like a “friendly stray dog” whose “unkempt appearance and tendency towards self-reliance betray its lack of an owner” (205). These lines betray theunfortunate, mangy image foisted on single women by society. They need an owner, or a man, for them to be acceptable.
To Jahren, it seems that many women manage to juggle career, relationship, and children. She notes: “It seemed outrageous to hope that fertility, resources, time, desire, and love could all come together in the right way, and yet most women did eventually walk that path” (75). Jahren does eventually find happiness with her husband and son, but she nonetheless confesses to feelings of inadequacybefore meeting her husband. Jahren demonstrates that even a successful woman must contend with residual societal misogyny and pressures.
Financial Injustice
Throughout the memoir, themes of financial injustice surface. Jahren frequently brings up the issue of funding her research. Because her scientific research is “curiosity-driven” (122), Jahren has to fight to receive the funding she feels her projects deserve. Other scientific projects that yield a product, like medicine or a machine, receive funding more easily. Especially early on in her career, Jahren struggles to make ends meet. She has to supply her labs with second-hand equipment, sometimes taking it from other labs on campus. She underlines this imbalance within the scientific and larger grant-funding community.
A significant effect of this financial injustice is Bill’s lifestyle. Bill’s salary is paid by grant funding until he receives a job at the University of Hawaii. When Jahren receives little funding early on in her career, she can hardly afford to pay Bill.In Atlanta, he first lives in a “filthy firetrap” (131)apartment then moves into a Volkswagen Vanagon. Instead of being able to focus on her research, Jahren consistently has to worry about finding enough money to fund her lab and pay her lab partner.
