Culture Clashes On Womens' Day.
March 8th is Womens' Day in Kazakhstan. Here are some of the features of this holiday:
- We get the day off school.
- Men give women presents and congratulate them on Womens' Day.
- Volunteers get asked many many times if we celebrate Womens' Day in the USA, and when we answer no, the response is always, like clockwork, over and over again, exactly the same accusation: "But we call it 'International Womens' Day'!"
- Volunteers accidentally congratulate men, who respond incredulously, "not my holiday".
My weekly English-language math club fell on Womens' Day, so I tried to have a talk about why there are so few female mathematicians. For me, and for everyone, I think, it was a very stressful, antagonistic experience that I almost regret. Besides me, there were three men, two Turkish and one Kazakh, and three women, all Kazakh. These women, at least, are just as good as the men in question at math. However, the "discussion" was dominated by the Turkic men waxing about how women are not as good at quantitative things as men are, that they are made for softer, more humanitarian tasks, that this is the way God made us and the way it has been since the days of cavemen, etc., and me arguing against them. That is to say, however you slice it, the whole thing was dominated by men, myself being a man as well. I tried to coax or cajole the women into the conversation, but they mostly stared at their shoes or confirmed the accusations levelled against their gender.
The mood darkened as I grew exasperated against my will, and finally, when one the Kazakh said that no matter how good a woman might be at math she will never be better than a man and one of the Turkish men said that there have been no great female physicists or mathematicians of any kind, we got into the math lesson, which was about Sophie Germain primes (the most accessible significant contribution to mathematics by a woman that I could find). Most of the six got stuck on the definition (a pair of Germain primes are two numbers such that n and 2n+1 are both prime), and I think everyone left frustrated and unsatisfied.
I think it was out of spite, then, that I selected the song "For Today I Am a Boy" by Antony and the Johnsons for today's music club:
"One day I'll grow up and be a beautiful woman
One day I'll grow up and be a beautiful girl
But for today I am a child
But for today I am a boy."
One of my Turkish friends even excused himself immediately after reading the lyrics (though he often leaves early, and he may not have left because of this song), and there was tangible discomfort in the room as I put the recording on. However, the music carried the day, and to Antony's great credit by the end, everyone -- men and all -- were singing happily along. And this is how it happened that an artist who claims Boy George as one of his greatest inspirations carried Womens' Day in Kazakhstan.
- We get the day off school.
- Men give women presents and congratulate them on Womens' Day.
- Volunteers get asked many many times if we celebrate Womens' Day in the USA, and when we answer no, the response is always, like clockwork, over and over again, exactly the same accusation: "But we call it 'International Womens' Day'!"
- Volunteers accidentally congratulate men, who respond incredulously, "not my holiday".
My weekly English-language math club fell on Womens' Day, so I tried to have a talk about why there are so few female mathematicians. For me, and for everyone, I think, it was a very stressful, antagonistic experience that I almost regret. Besides me, there were three men, two Turkish and one Kazakh, and three women, all Kazakh. These women, at least, are just as good as the men in question at math. However, the "discussion" was dominated by the Turkic men waxing about how women are not as good at quantitative things as men are, that they are made for softer, more humanitarian tasks, that this is the way God made us and the way it has been since the days of cavemen, etc., and me arguing against them. That is to say, however you slice it, the whole thing was dominated by men, myself being a man as well. I tried to coax or cajole the women into the conversation, but they mostly stared at their shoes or confirmed the accusations levelled against their gender.
The mood darkened as I grew exasperated against my will, and finally, when one the Kazakh said that no matter how good a woman might be at math she will never be better than a man and one of the Turkish men said that there have been no great female physicists or mathematicians of any kind, we got into the math lesson, which was about Sophie Germain primes (the most accessible significant contribution to mathematics by a woman that I could find). Most of the six got stuck on the definition (a pair of Germain primes are two numbers such that n and 2n+1 are both prime), and I think everyone left frustrated and unsatisfied.
I think it was out of spite, then, that I selected the song "For Today I Am a Boy" by Antony and the Johnsons for today's music club:
"One day I'll grow up and be a beautiful woman
One day I'll grow up and be a beautiful girl
But for today I am a child
But for today I am a boy."
One of my Turkish friends even excused himself immediately after reading the lyrics (though he often leaves early, and he may not have left because of this song), and there was tangible discomfort in the room as I put the recording on. However, the music carried the day, and to Antony's great credit by the end, everyone -- men and all -- were singing happily along. And this is how it happened that an artist who claims Boy George as one of his greatest inspirations carried Womens' Day in Kazakhstan.
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