Global InformationList of female nominees for the Nobel Prize information
The Nobel Prize (Swedish: Nobelpriset) is a set of five different prizes that, according to its benefactor Alfred Nobel, in his 1895 will, must be awarded "to those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind”. The five prizes are awarded in the fields of Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature, and Peace.[1]
As of 2023, 65 Nobel Prizes and the Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences have been awarded to 64 women[2] and since 1901, the year wherein the awarding of the prizes began, hundreds of women have already been nominated and shortlisted carefully in each field.[3][4]
The first woman to win a Nobel Prize was Marie Curie, who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903 with her husband, Pierre Curie, and Henri Becquerel.[5][6] Curie is also the only woman to have won multiple Nobel Prizes; in 1911, she won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Curie's daughter, Irène Joliot-Curie, won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1935, making the two the only mother-daughter pair to have won Nobel Prizes.[5] Of the currently revealed female nominees both in physics and chemistry, the notable scientists Henrietta Swan Leavitt, Astrid Cleve, Harriet Brooks, Alice Ball, Mileva Marić, Inge Lehmann, Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, Leona Woods and Helen Parsons were not included.
In 1912, Mary Edwards Walker became the first ever woman nominated for prize in physiology or medicine but her nomination was later declared invalid by the Nobel Committee because her nominator was not invited to nominate that year.[7] Hence, Cécile Vogt-Mugnier, nominated first in 1922, became the official first female nominee but never won despite numerous recommendations.[3] She was followed by Maud Slye who was nominated in the year 1923, but again never won. Only in 1947, that the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was finally awarded to a woman, Gerty Cori, sharing with her husband Carl Ferdinand Cori.[8] Of the 13 currently revealed female nominees, the physiologists Nettie Stevens, Frieda Robscheit-Robbins, Rosalind Franklin, Miriam Michael Stimson, Louise Pearce, Virginia Apgar, Hattie Alexander and Alice Catherine Evans were not included.
The most number of female nominees was in the field of literature. The first woman to be nominated was the German memoirist Malwida von Meysenbug for the year 1901.[3] She was nominated by the French historian Gabriel Monod but unfortunately did not win the prize.[9] Her nomination was followed by Émilie Lerou and Selma Lagerlöf for the year 1904. Lagerlöf would later on become the first woman to win the prize in the year 1909.[10] Of the 77 currently revealed female nominees for the literature category, the celebrated authors Kate Chopin, Alfonsina Storni, Virginia Woolf, Simone Weil, Edith Nesbit, Delmira Agustini, Willa Cather, Gertrude Stein, Edith Hamilton, Marina Tsvetaeva, Zora Neale Hurston, Fannie Hurst, Flannery O'Connor and Agatha Christie were not included.[11][12][13]
The first women nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize were Belva Ann Lockwood and Bertha von Suttner, who would eventually be awarded in 1905.[3] The latter was considered for authoring Lay Down Your Arms! and contributing to the creation of the Prize.[14] Of the 57 currently revealed female nominees, the famous Susan B. Anthony, Florence Nightingale, Clara Barton, Harriet Tubman, Mary Harris Jones, Olive Schreiner, Aletta Jacobs, Emmeline Pankhurst, Ida B. Wells, Käthe Kollwitz, Muriel Lester, Katharine Drexel, Helene Schweitzer, Marie Stopes, Vera Brittain, Ava Helen Pauling, Golda Meir, Rachel Carson and Rosa Parks were not included.[15][16]
- ^ "The Nobel Prize". www.nobelprize.org. Nobel Foundation. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ "Nobel Prize awarded women". nobelprize.org. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
- ^ a b c d "Nomination Archive - Nominated Women". Nobel Foundation. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ "Nomination archive – List of female nominees". nobelprize.org. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ a b "Nobel Laureates Facts - Women". Nobel Foundation. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ "Nobel Prize in Physics 1903". Nobel Foundation. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
invalidwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ "The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1947". Nobel Foundation. Archived from the original on 19 October 2013. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ Asaid, Alan (26 September 2009). "This is how the Academy misjudged the women". Svenska Dagbladet. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ "Nobel Prize in Literature 1909". Nobel Foundation. Archived from the original on 2008-10-17. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ "10 great writers snubbed by the Nobel Prize". The Telegraph. Retrieved 17 November 2023.
- ^ Fleming, Donald (October 1966). "Nobel's Hits and Misses". The Atlantic. Retrieved 17 November 2023.
- ^ Crittenden, Ann. "A Comedy of Errors at the Nobel Prize". American Heritage. Retrieved 17 November 2023.
- ^ Geir Lundestad (15 March 2003). ""The Nobel Peace Prize, 1901–2000"". Nobel Foundation. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ "Have you heard of these 20 women who changed the world?". girlguiding.org.uk. 8 March 2020. Retrieved 3 December 2020.
- ^ Irwin Abrams (22 September 1997). "Heroines of peace – the nine Nobel women, 1901-1992". Nobel Prize.org. Retrieved 3 December 2020.