Professor Samantha Brennan looks at some examples of micro-inequalities, including everyday workplace interactions, and look to their cumulative effects in support of the claim that we should reconsider the moral importance of small inequalities.

Abstract: The Barnard Report on Women, Work, and the Academy describes these twin causes of women's inequality in the academy in these terms: "The first is that biases operating below the threshold of deliberate consciousness, biases in interaction that are unrecognized and unintended, can systematically put women and minorities at a disadvantage. Second, although individual instances of these "micro-inequities" may seem trivial, their cumulative effects can account for large-scale differences in outcome; those who benefit from greater opportunity and a reinforcing environment find their advantages compounded, while deficits of support and recognition ramify for those who are comparatively disadvantaged (MIT 1999: 10). In this talk I look at some examples of micro-inequalities, including everyday workplace interactions, and look to their cumulative effects in support of the claim that we should reconsider the moral importance of small inequalities.