500 Queer Scientists is a visibility campaign for LGBTQ+ people working in the sciences.

Queer ''Queer'' is an umbrella term for people who are non-heterosexual or non- cisgender. Originally meaning or , ''queer'' came to be used pejoratively against LGBTQ people in the late 19th century. From the late 1980s, queer activists began to ...

scientists submit short descriptions of their lives to the organization; these are manually checked and proof-read before being posted to the group's website. In collating submissions, the organization intends to show queer people currently working in science that there are others like them, to provide role models for future generations of researchers, and to create a database that can be used when planning events to ensure representation.

History

The group was founded in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

on 4 June 2018, by Lauren Esposito, an

arachnology Arachnology is the science, scientific study of arachnids, which comprise spiders and related invertebrates such as scorpions, Pseudoscorpionida, pseudoscorpions, Opiliones, harvestmen, Tick, ticks, and mites. Those who study spiders and other a ...

professor at the

California Academy of Sciences The California Academy of Sciences is a research institute and natural history museum in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, that is among the largest List of natural history museums, museums of natural history in the world, housing over ...

and Sean Vidal Edgerton, a science illustrator and evolutionary virologist at the academy. In the press release announcing its foundation, the organization referenced, as part of its motivation, a 2016 paper in the ''

Journal of Homosexuality The ''Journal of Homosexuality'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal covering research into sexual practices and gender roles in their cultural, historical, interpersonal, and modern social contexts. History The founding editor-in-chief was Ch ...

'' that found that, in 2013, more than 40% of respondents to a survey who identified as

LGBTQ+ LGBTQ people are individuals who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning. Many variants of the initialism are used; LGBTQIA+ people incorporates intersex, asexual, aromantic, agender, and other individuals. The group i ...

had not revealed that they were to their colleagues. The campaign was inspired by the group

500 Women Scientists 500 Women Scientists is a non-profit group dedicated to making science open, inclusive, and accessible. To achieve this mission, they work to increase scientific literacy through public engagement, advocate for science and equity, and provide self ...

; the two groups are separate, but consider themselves to be "informally partnered". At launch, the site contained 50 scientists' stories; within a week this had reached 250, and by 26 June there were 550. The first stories were all written in English. In June 2019, they held an event with publisher

Elsevier Elsevier ( ) is a Dutch academic publishing company specializing in scientific, technical, and medical content. Its products include journals such as ''The Lancet'', ''Cell (journal), Cell'', the ScienceDirect collection of electronic journals, ...

to mark World Pride. The site had over 900 profiles by July 2019; in that month, the group was involved in organizing the second LGBTSTEM Day.

Recognition

For founding 500 Queer Scientists, the

National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals Out to Innovate, previously known as the National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals (NOGLSTP), is a professional society for professionals in science, technology, mathematics, and engineering. Each year, Out to I ...

awarded the 2019 Walt Westman Award to Lauren Esposito.

Notable people included

David Adger David Adger (born 23 September 1967) is a Professor of Linguistics at Queen Mary University of London. Adger is interested in the human capacity for syntax. Adger served as president of the Linguistics Association of Great Britain from 2015 to ...

* Clara Barker * Cynthia Bauerle *

Alex Bond Alexander L. Bond is a Canadian conservation biologist, ecologist, and curator. He holds the position of Principal Curator and Curator in Charge of Birds at the Natural History Museum at Tring. Bond is actively involved with the marine plasti ...

* Ben Britton * Peter Coles *

Lynn Conway Lynn Ann Conway (January 2, 1938 – June 9, 2024) was an American computer scientist, electrical engineer, and transgender activist. In the 1960s, while working at IBM, Conway invented generalized dynamic instruction handling, a key advance ...

* Rochelle Diamond * Jan J. Eldridge * Lauren Esposito * Michael Francis Fay * Jon Freeman * Sam Giles * Abhik Ghosh * Lisa Graumlich * Renée Hložek * J. David Jentsch * Autumn Kent * Nathan H. Lents * Katie Mack * Anson W. Mackay * Jessica Mink *

Shaun O'Boyle Shaun O'Boyle is a science communicator, podcast producer and activist, best known for his work to promote science and to improve representation of LGBTQ+ scientists. He was the chair and one of the organisers of the Irish March for Science and a ...

* Jonathon Rendina * David K. Smith * Jessica Ware * Tristram Wyatt * Jeremy Yoder

References

{{reflist

External links

500 Queer Scientists
2018 establishments in the United States LGBTQ organizations based in the United States Science advocacy organizations Organizations for LGBTQ science

History

Recognition

Notable people included

See also

References

External links