Irène Joliot-Curie

Irène Joliot-Curie (née Curie; 12 September 1897 – 17 March 1956) was a French chemist and physicist, famous for sharing the 1935 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with her husband, Frédéric Joliot-Curie, for their discovery of induced radioactivity and positron emission.

Quotes

Louis-Pascal Jacquemond (Automne 2012) . "Irène Joliot-Curie, une féministe engagée ?". Genre & Histoire.

Il y avait des questions sur lesquelles ma mère avait des opinions d’une intransigeance absolue. Par exemple, elle estimait que les femmes devaient avoir les mêmes droits, et d’ailleurs les mêmes devoirs que les hommes.
- Translation: There were some issues on which my mother held absolutely uncompromising opinions. For example, she believed that women should have the same rights, and indeed the same duties, as men.

(En ce qui concerne le vote des femmes) ma mère a toujours soutenu énergiquement la nécessité de cette réforme.
- Translation: (Concerning women's right to vote) my mother always vigorously supported the necessity of this reform.

J’ai remarqué que chaque jour ou presque un ministre anglais manque de se faire tuer par les suffragettes, mais il me semble que ce n’est pas une manière très brillante de démontrer qu’elles sont capables de voter.
- Translation: I've noticed that almost every day an English minister is nearly killed by suffragettes, but it seems to me that this isn't a very brilliant way to demonstrate that they are capable of voting.

Pour que la femme conquière l’égalité avec les hommes, il est nécessaire, indispensable qu’elle ait le droit de participer à la vie politique du pays. Le droit de vote des femmes, c’est une question de principe et les questions de principe ont une très grande importance.
- Translation: For women to achieve equality with men, it is necessary, indeed indispensable, that they have the right to participate in the political life of the country. Women's suffrage is a matter of principle, and matters of principle have a very great importance.

Growing up with internationally renowned parents, Irène led a life marked by both expectations and obligations. Irène, like her mother, chose to marry a scientist, Frédéric Joliot, with whom she would collaborate successfully (leading eventually to a joint Nobel Prize in Chemistry) and have two children, both of whom would become part of the next generation of scientists. Even with all of her successes, the difficulties of being a woman in the sciences affected Irène, as they had her mother. Denied memberships and honors given to men with equal successes, both Marie and Irène fought for their place, respectability and research opportunities.
- Penny J. Gilmer, Chiu, MH., Gilmer, P.J., Treagust, D.F., eds. (2011). "Chapter. Irène Joliot-Curie, a Nobel Laureate in Artificial Radioactivity by P. J. Gilmer". Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of Madame Marie Sklodowska Curie’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry. SensePublishers. pp. 41–57.

... Frédéric Joliot ... was so honored to be entering the Curie family that he changed his last name to Joliot-Curie. Like Marie and Pierre, Irème amd Frédéric also did research together. Their special subject was radioactive chemical elements.
- Mary Ann Montgomery, Marie Curie. Silver Burdett Press. 1990. p. 81. ISBN 9780382099816. (104 pages; juvenile nonfiction; illustrated by Severino Bararldi)

In many ways, the team of Frédéric and Irène Joliot-Curie, as they chose to call themselves, must have reminded Marie Curie of her own partnership with Pierre. Frédéric, like Pierre, was a physicist and a tinkerer who loved playing around with instruments. Irène, like her mother, was more the chemist.
- Susan Quinn, Marie Curie: A Life. Simon & Schuster. 1995. p. 426. ISBN 9780671675424. (509 pages)

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