Hi, everyone.
This letter is addressed to the American Philatelic Society, to the editor of The American Philatelist, and copied to gendergap, a Wikimedia Foundation mailing list.
I'm doing a little research on behalf of Wikipedia with respect to gender. You may have noticed the New York Time's article about involvement of women on Wikipedia, https://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/31/business/media/31link.html
Sue Gardner, executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation has been concerned about this issue and we are discussing it, in part on a mailing list, gendergap@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/gendergap that is open to public participation.
I've been reading books about stamp collecting lately and in "The Error World: An Affair with Stamps" by Simon Garfield I found this quotation:
It is a passage quoted from a piece of "light fiction", by Robert Graves published in 1936, "Antigua, Penny, Puce":
"All English Schoolboys of a certain age collect postage stamps or at least all schoolboys whose parents have a little money, below a certain social level the collecting instinct must, we suppose, be satisfied largely with cigarette pictures and gift coupons. Schoolgirls, on the other hand...schoolgirls do not go in for stamp collecting, in fact, they usually despise the pursuit, which is not direct and personal enough to satisfy them emotionally; if they collect anything it is signed photographs of famous actresses and actors. But they have brothers, and brothers collect stamps. So in the holidays they very often consent to lend a hand in the game. They rummage in bedroom drawers, and in their parents's writing desks, and in boxes in the attic, and sometimes make quite useful finds. The brothers are touched and gratified. Schoolgirls are not interested in stamps, agree, but - this is the important point - they are interested in their brothers' preoccupation with stamps. What is it all about? What is the sense of it?"
When I read that I flashed on the insight that Wikipedia is a hobby, and very similar to stamp collecting at that. I find there is a common emotional feel about both avocations, but perhaps that is just me.
And I wondered what the statistics are with respect to women participating in stamp collecting. What percentage of APS members are women? Of collectors generally? My suspicion is that it is very similar to the 15% of Wikipedia editors.
Fred Bauder APS 128302 Wikipedia User:Fred Bauder
BTW, I'm sure the gender gap has been covered in The American Philatelist before, but I couldn't find a convenient way to search the archives. Please advise me with respect to that.