Professor Schiebinger tapped to lead IRWG

Londa Schiebinger, the Edwin E. Sparks Professor of History of Science at Pennsylvania State University, has been named director of the Institute for Research on Women and Gender (IRWG), effective April 1.

"We are delighted that Londa Schiebinger is joining the school as professor of history and director of IRWG," said Sharon Long, dean of the School of Humanities and Sciences. "Londa is both a scholarly star and a superb leader and organizer who will be able to take our programs at the institute to new levels."

Schiebinger, co-director of Penn State's Science, Medicine and Technology in Culture Program, has done historical work on gender issues in science. She is the author of the forthcoming Plants and Empire: Colonial Bioprospecting in the Atlantic World. Her other books include The Mind Has No Sex? Women in the Origins of Modern Science (1989), Nature's Body: Gender in the Making of Modern Science (1993) and Has Feminism Changed Science? (1999).