Lost in Space?
The BBC reports that China is to start scouting its high schools next year to find candidates to be the country’s first woman in space.
But it might not be the giant leap for gender equality they had been hoping for. Earlier reports have already laid out the division of labour clearly, saying the first female astronaut would be allowed to do research work while the spacecraft would actually be piloted by a male colleague.
Always interested in cross-culturally gendered space, this also reminds me of a USA Today ( the paper that most often offends me) article that looked at how contemporary China is trying to balance greater openness with an avoidance of the worst excesses of the West. If you’re able to get past the asinine editorialising, there are some interesting observations.