Report of the American Historical Association Committee on the Status of Women
Part Three: Summary of Findings
The proportion of women receiving doctorates in all fields has
never been high, but it has been lower in the 1950's and 1960's
than it was in 1920, 1930, or 1940. Most recent figures show about
eleven percent of doctorates going to women, down from the earlier
high of sixteen percent in the twenties and thirties. The percents
in history run a little higher than the overall figures. During
the last ten years the ten leading graduate departments of history
(based on the 1966 American Council on Education evaluation) have
been granting about fifteen percent of their Ph.D.'s to women. The
proportion of women receiving M.A.'s in history from these universities
is nearly double those receiving Ph.D.'s.
Although women receive Ph.D.'s in history from leading graduate
departments, they are not appointed to these faculties in significant
numbers. (See Appendix A) These departments employed between 98
and 99 percent men on their faculties, the women serving primarily
in the lower ranks. Five of these leading departments appointed
no woman to any of the three professorial ranks. In the first three
of these years none of the departments had a woman full professor,
and only three of the ten departments had a woman full professor
at any time during this period. Women constitute about ten percent
of the history department members of ten excellent coeducational
liberal arts colleges. For the graduate departments the figure is
less than two percent. Most startling, however, is the progressive
deterioration in the status of women in the departments of coeducational
colleges. In 1959-60 sixteen percent of the full professors were
women, but in 1968-69 only one woman full professor remained, and
she retired the following year. The decline is undoubtedly largely
attributable to the retirement of the generation of women historians
trained in the twenties and thirties combined with the tendency
to hire men in the post-war years. A decline is also noticeable
in the proportion of women associate professors; only among the
assistant professors is any increase perceptible. Seven of the ten
women's colleges surveyed follow the pattern customarily associated
with them of having had a high proportion of women in their history
faculties during the first half of the century followed by a decline
in the last decade.
One factor militating against the advancement of women Ph.D.'s is
the widely-held assumption that women prefer to marry and devote
themselves to domestic life. This assumption is belied by the evidence
offered by Helen S. Astin in The Woman Doctorate in America. She
shows that 91 percent of the women receiving doctorates in all fields
in the mid-fifties were employed in some type of work seven years
later. Moreover, married women Ph.D.'s who are employed full-time
show a higher publication rate than either unmarried women Ph.D.'s
or men Ph.D.'s, according to the studies of Rita Simon, Shirley
Merritt Clark, and Kathleen Galway. The discrepancy between women's
professional status and performance is thus not grounded in any
lack of commitment to the life of learning. Lawrence Simpson's ingenious
investigations have thrown new light on the problem. He has shown
that those who practice discrimination against women in academic
employment also hold general views concerning female inferiority.
Prejudiced attitudes are strongest among men who have been in teaching
and/or administration for a period of from five to twenty years.
This age group may be assumed to constitute the majority of decision
maker: in almost any department. The least prejudiced attitudes
toward women are found in those under 30 and over 60 years of age.
In history as in other academic areas, our sample of thirty institutions
indicates women are employed primarily in non-tenured ranks. Moreover,
far from abandoning their professions for pure domesticity, their
very eagerness to work has made women vulnerable to exploitation.
Their readiness--and sometimes their need--to accept irregular and
part-time positions has led to their exclusion from participation
in the main stream of academic rewards and preferment. Opening regular
career lines to partially employed women emerges from our findings
as an urgent need. Faculties and students stand to benefit no less
than women whose services are presently not adequately utilized
and recognized. (See Resolutions, III, 4 (b)).
Finally, the Association should take note of the fact that it has
no better record than the colleges and universities we have surveyed
in engaging the participation of women in its central activities.
(See Resolutions, III, 3, and Appendix C)
Last Updated: May 22, 2007
