What is the DPT?

Elsa Neumann was the first woman in Germany to be allowed to study physics with exceptional permission. In 1899 she passed her PhD exam in Berlin with flying colours. Since then more than a hundred years have passed in which women have asserted themselves in this male-dominated discipline. But they are still a minority. Just once a year the situation changes - when German female physicists meet.

The Deutsche Physikerinnentagung is an annual and, by now, well established institution since 1997. It considers itself as a forum for women in physics. During Deutsche Physikerinnentagung, committed and interested female scientists of all research areas, careers, occupational fields, regions and qualifications are present. The meeting does not only focus on scientific discussion, but also on the exchange of experiences and presentations on professional perspectives of physicists. All women connected with physics - pupils, students, lecturers, researchers, teachers or physicists in industry - are invited, as well as all men who want to support the purposes of the meeting.

Since the nineties there were frequent meetings between female physicists in Germany where they presented physical topics as well as discussed social questions. In 1997 such a meeting, which took place in Berlin, was called the Deutsche Physikerinnentagung (DPT) by the attending physicists for the first time. An initiative was drafted on the interests of female physicists in the German Physical Society (Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft, DPG). Since then, the DPT has been supported. One year later, in 1998, the DPT took place in Hamburg. At the end of the meeting the then-president of the DPG, Alexander Bradshaw, confirm the foundation of the working group equal opportunity (Arbeitskreis Chancengleichheit, AKC) of the DPG. Since 2006 the DPT is announced as a DPG meeting.

Since 2011 it is allowed as a trial test that men also give subject-related talks. The fraction of allowed talks given by men depends on the fraction of invited female speakers at the annual DPG spring meeting (DPG-Frühjahrstagungen).