Diversity in Natural Resource Science Professions-Using Feminine Attributes to Broaden Diversity

摘要

I read and re-read Aldo Leopold's Sand County Almanac, but never felt the connection that others in my natural resource classes seemed to find. Perhaps it was because I was not from the Midwest; it was perhaps because I was female; or perhaps becauseI did not grow up in a hunting household. On the other hand, when I read Rachel Carson I was inspired and I gained environmental awareness, especially through her books Under the Sea-Wind and Silent Spring. Carson became my conservation heroine; perhapsthis was because I spent my early youth near the ocean. All connections we make to our environment have some basis in establishing our comfort zones. However, two well-educated people of European descent wrote these books. How then, do we motivate and bring others of different backgrounds to join an inclusive democracy of science and management of natural resources? We aspire to make the fisheries and natural resource sciences and management look more representative of our national and international human populations. Unless we achieve this goal, we will risk the future of our global natural resources to be socially, economically, and environmentally sustainable.