We must focus on women’s achievements, not looks

Rym Ghazal wonders why there are so few women among Nobel prize winners.

Austrian-born American actress Hedy Lamarr (1913 - 2000), developed a keen interest in applied science, and bored by her acting career, utilised this knowledge as an inventor. Silver Screen CollectionShow more

The saying that “behind every great man is an even greater woman”, has become a cliché. Why? Because if you dig into history, it rings true.

Let’s go back to 1876. A Swedish newspaper advertisement read: “Wealthy, highly educated elderly gentleman seeks lady of mature age, versed in languages, as secretary and supervisor of household.”

It was Alfred Nobel, the founder of the Nobel Prizes, who at the age of 43 must have felt old and lonely given his workaholic tendencies. (I am reminded of another saying here: “Work can never love you back.”)

An Austrian woman, Countess Bertha Kinsky, applied and was hired. She worked for Nobel for a short while before leaving for Austria to marry Count Arthur von Suttner. But Nobel continued to admire and care about the now Baroness Bertha von Suttner, and they exchanged letters. It is said that she influenced Nobel, an armaments manufacturer who invented dynamite, to establish a prize for peace.

“Inform me, convince me and then I will do something great for the movement,” Nobel told the baroness.

She also became the first woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1905. She had long been a prominent figure in the peace movement and wrote the 1889 anti-war novel, Lay Down Your Arms.

A woman may have had a great influence on Nobel, but women are still underrepresented among Nobel Prize winners, as they are in many other areas.

Over and over we hear how women are paid less than their male colleagues in the same positions, and how their work often gets less recognition from both officialdom and the public.

For example, between 1901 and 2015, 874 laureates and 26 organisations have been awarded the Nobel Prize. The total number of female winners? Just 49.

The Polish scientist Marie Sklodowska Curie is the first person and the only woman to have been honoured twice, with the 1903 Nobel Prize in physics and the 1911 Nobel Prize in chemistry. She was the first woman to win in both categories as well.

And no wonder, considering her philosophy on life. Curie said: “Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and, above all, confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.”

Her daughter, Irène Joliot-Curie, followed in her mother’s footsteps and won the chemistry prize in 1935. But it took until 2009 before Elinor Ostrom became the first woman to receive the economics prize.

Some notable Peace Prize winners are Albania’s Mother Teresa in 1979, Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi in 1991 and Pakistan’s Malala Yousafzai in 2014.

There are other ways in which women are recognised, including Forbes magazine's list of most powerful women in the world, published since 2004. Emirati women regularly make it on to that list, proving that when there is government and public support, women do take up whatever opportunities are given to them and excel. Prizes and lists highlight work that may go unnoticed and might inspire others.

One of my favourite stories is about Hollywood star Hedy Lamarr, once known as the most beautiful woman in the world, who invented a frequency-hopping communication system used by the US in the Second World War. She didn’t get any recognition for what was the precursor to the wireless technologies we use today until just before her death in 2000.

History is filled with inspirational stories of women making a real difference, yet too often we focus on their looks, what they wear and how much they weigh.

On Twitter: @Arabianmau