Physics Colloquium / Dr. Pauline Gagnon: What's wrong with me?

Datum

14.11.2023

Zeit

14:50 - 16:20

Sprache

en

Hauptthema

Willkommen

Andere Themen

Willkommen

Beschreibung

Event announcement as pdf-Download (https://tu-dresden.de/mn/physik/ressourcen/dateien/physikalisches-kolloquium/2023-11-14-Phys_Kolloq-Gagnon-WiSe2023.pdf).

Abstract: Why are sexism, homophobia and racism still so prevalent in physics? I start from my personal experience to demonstrate that in fact the personal is political. CERN, the largest physics laboratory in the world, welcomes scientists from 112 nationalities but still about 80% of them are white and 80% are male. I examine why people from so many various groups have been historically excluded from physics and suggest a series of easily applicable measures that could greatly improve diversity in physics. These measures would benefit all scientists, regardless of their gender, race, sexual orientation, physical ability or religion. It has been established that diversity benefits science by increasing the creativity potential, a key ingredient in scientific research.

Short bio: I was born in Chicoutimi in Quebec, Canada in 1955. As a kid, I dreamt of understanding what were the fundamental constituents of matter. After teaching physics for a few years in local colleges, I moved to California in 1985. I first studied at San Francisco State University then completed a PhD in particle physics at University of California in Santa Cruz. After that, I started my research activities at CERN, the European Laboratory for Particle Physics located near Geneva, where I worked as a Senior Research Scientist with Indiana University. I participated to the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012 and looked for dark matter within the ATLAS experiment. From 2011-2014, I joined the CERN Communication group, writing blogs and answering questions from numerous media worldwide. Explaining particle physics in simple and accessible terms became my trademark. In 2014, I wrote a popular science book called “Who cares about particle physics: Making sense of the Higgs boson, the Large Hadron Collider and CERN”.

Since retiring in 2014, I have given more than one hundred fifty presentations to various audiences in fourteen countries, talking about physics, diversity issues and Mileva Marić Einstein. I am currently writing a screenplay for a mini-series on Mileva Marić Einstein and other women in science.

Links

• Termindetails auf den Webseiten der TU Dresden (https://tu-dresden.de)

Letztmalig verändert: 14.11.2023, 07:37:08