Scientific American, the United States’s oldest continuously published magazine, today announced the appointment of Mariette DiChristina as the eighth and first female editor-in-chief in the magazine’s 164-year history.
DiChristina, formerly the magazine’s executive editor, will oversee the print, Web, and special newsstand editions of both Scientific American and Scientific American Mind from their New York offices. Reflecting upon the historical significance of her promotion, DiChristina wrote in an email that she believes having a female editor-in-chief at Scientific American reflects ideals inherent in science itself. Science, she says, “consists of a diverse array of disciplines and embraces the different interests and viewpoints of people working in those disciplines…. Having a woman as editor-in-chief of Scientific American might encourage people to think, ‘Hey, science could include someone like me.’”
DiChristina’s appointment comes nearly six months after Scientific American laid off more than twenty employees, including editor-in-chief John Rennie and president Steven Yee. Around the same time, in what Portfolio reported as a “major reorganization” of the magazine’s administration, the London-based Nature Publishing Group—a division of Macmillan Publishers—assumed the operation of Scientific American, which had previously operated as an independent entity within the Macmillan hierarchy. Rennie had served Scientific American for twenty years, including the last fifteen as editor-in-chief. DiChristina had been the magazine’s acting editor-in-chief since Rennie’s departure.
Now, with the magazine’s editorial leadership finally established, Scientific American staffers can begin to put the strain of June’s staffing shake-up behind them. “It’s a clear benefit to Scientific American,” DiChristina says. “That lets us move forward more decisively and focus on the future.”
Indeed, progress at the magazine is evident: the monthly unique views at ScientificAmerican.com for October topped off at 2.09 million (a 1.8 percent increase over the same month last year) while page views for the same month were listed at 8.9 million, an increase of 3.2% percent (according to Omniture, a web analytics firm). The new editor says that the upward trends are the result of Scientific American’s ownership transition.
“The media announcements that we make now get the support of the Nature publicity team. And Scientific American’s Web site has been enriched by being able to offer additional content for visitors from Nature News and also Nature-produced videos,” reports DiChristina. By contrast, growth during the magazine’s years as an independent entity at Macmillan may have been inhibited, given that “Scientific American stood alone as the sole consumer magazine in what was essentially a book division of Macmillan U.S.”
DiChristina’s philosophy for the magazine emphasizes reader input. “As a longtime science journalist,” she says, “I find the case for ‘evolution and selection’ very compelling. By that I mean I’m always looking for ways to make the print and digital editions of the magazine more appealing for readers—and readers ‘select’ them by letting us know what they like and what they don’t.” Some changes so far include the reorganization of ScientificAmerican.com for easier navigation, and the restructuring of the print magazine’s News Scan feature, the items in which will now be aligned by reader interest.
“Publications are organic creatures, and they adapt over time to survive,” she says. In addition to the editorial changes she’s employed, DiChristina is thinking long-term. “I have also been speaking with members of the Nature Publishing Group’s educational division to see what role Scientific American might play in inspiring an interest in science in young people (a.k.a., future readers and science-interested citizens).”
Promoting youth interest in the magazine is something the new editor, a mother of two, is presently doing at home. Before her appointment was announced to the media today—spurring all sorts of commentary on women in science and leadership roles—DiChristina consulted her two daughters on the matter last night over dinner. “My eighth grader said, ‘Well, Mommy, it gives something people to look up to.’ I felt rather humbled by that.”
Reporting contributed by Curtis Brainard.
Continued, mindless use of the term 'glass ceiling' by journalists illustrates how the vocabulary and framing of the liberal urban middle classes are reflexively adopted by journalists, who are members of that class. The 'glass ceiling' is a myth. Almost all statistical disparities in career achievement are accountable by factors other than the tired 1960s reliance on 'isms'. Women who have been in the career pipeline eventually rise to about the same level as their male peers.
#1 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Mon 7 Dec 2009 at 12:06 PM
Really? You mean corporations don't hesitate at all to offer women senior positions even though there's a greater risk of them departing because of maternity issues?
And women aren't treated as a cheaper labor pool because of that risk potential? That's news to me, as well as many women I'd imagine.
When it comes to non-essential, replaceable positions women are at par with men in America in numbers, though in salary they come in at about 70 to 80 percent. When it comes to essential positions in which replacement costs are high, women are a 10 percent minority.
#2 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Mon 7 Dec 2009 at 01:17 PM
Yes, I'm essentially saying all that. "The glass ceiling" and other bumper-sticker political slogans are chump change compared to other factors - most obviously, experience and ability. "Maternity issues" are a valid aspect of such judgments - do you really think that competing women without such issues don't look askance at the idea that maternity leave is supposed to be irrelevent - and, as my ex-wife, an employer, noted, a lot of women really do not come back after having children. But are maternity issues really significant for women in their prime "senior candidate" years, from 40 onward?
#3 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Tue 8 Dec 2009 at 12:55 PM
Okay, in your first post you imply the glass ceiling doesn't exist, in your next post you say it exists for valid reasons.
And yes, maternity is a significant issue for women who make less salary for the same job and who get put on the slow, non-essential career tracks previous to turning 40 because of the potential for career interruption. On site daycare would be an interesting way to expand career options for employees at the workplace and I've heard of this tried in Europe with success, but American business culture is anti-family, therefore anti-mother, therefore anti-woman. It shouldn't be, it doesn't need to be, but it is and it results in a glass ceiling. You may not see it, being glass and all, but women do. It's there.
'
#4 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Tue 8 Dec 2009 at 02:27 PM
Thimbles, the term 'glass ceiling' is supposed to the 'ceilings' that are imposed by bad old sexist men. The term does not popularly refer to choices women themselves make which may put them off the executive path. And I notice you apparently didn't understand my question about whether maternity leave for women discriminates against women who choose not to have children. Modern left-wing ideology always stumbles into these rat's-nests of competing victimology.
BTW, western Europe's business culture is so family-friendly that it faces a demographic nightmare. The 'indigenous' population is declining below replacement levels. I could speculate on the connection, and what it may be saying about the evolution of affluenct societies into self-absorption and docility, but that would take us far afield.
#5 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Mon 14 Dec 2009 at 01:13 PM
Women don't make the choice to have a potentially career interrupting set of reproductive organs, and senior officers have to take the potential of career interruption into account before it occurs. Career women may not have children in her lifetime, but they are sidelined from critical promotions and equal pay because of the risk that they might be pulled away due to medical issues. They have to show exceptional performance to even be considered.
They are also a heavier burden on employer medical plans since they have the potential of being more expensive.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/30/us/30insure.html
And last, as Larry Summers demonstrated during his ridiculous tenure at Harvard, the bias against women in the science and math disciplines is strong.
Though it has risen far beyond what it was, the glass ceiling exists and it continues to prevent women from getting through about 90% of the time.
PS. Your contention about reducing family sizes and later fewer children is symptomatic of educated (University studies suck away time spent making young families) and career oriented populations. When women are educated and have a path to work, many choose work over family, economic liberty over domestic labor.
This happens in every society that emphasizes economic power and consumer gratification over social structure. People want to buy things so they spend their time doing things to make money, instead of children.
Furthermore, in societies where there's access to quality healthcare, the need for child redundancy is reduced. When mothers don't have to worry about losing a child or two to disease or injury, they can have risk having less children.
Let's not talk about immigrants displacing the indigenous population because that never turns out well.
#6 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Mon 14 Dec 2009 at 02:13 PM