math

One of my greatest high school regrets is that I never took an auto shop class. I would have had a chance to learn some practical skills like changing oil and changing a tire. At the time, I doubt it fit into my schedule, but entering a class of mostly boys scared me as well. It's not that I was afraid of boys—I considered myself a feminist despite not fully understanding what that meant—but it would still have been intimidating to walk into a classroom full of dudes. 

 

Studies on hard-wired sex differences suggest that even Barbie, whose careers have ranged from astronaut to computer engineer, struggles in the science. Why? Because she's a woman.

Yet according to a recent CBC radio story on the "man brain/ woman brain" debate, some psychologists believe that these "studies" lead to unhealthy stereotyping and self-fulfilling prophesies.

But seriously. "Daring to Discuss Women in Science" by John Tierney ran in the New York Times two days ago. In it, Tierney announces a proposed national law that would require the White House science adviser to oversee workshops aimed to close the gender gap in science and engineering. But rather than express support for the proposal ("Fulfilling the potential of women in academic science and engineering," section 124 out of 700-section bill, brief the 248-page PDF here), Tierney in so many words says, "You guys, I hate to be the buzzkill, but girls are worse at math than boys. I can prove it."

Long before Lawrence Summers’s unfortunate remarks at Harvard University a few years ago, there have always been powerful forces which assigned all manner of illogic to women’s "inability" to excel at math and science. Their brains were too feeble to handle such difficult concepts, they claimed. And besides! Math and science were "right brain" and therefore "masculine" sciences so it wasn’t in a woman’s nature to be interested. Although there were some textbooks written to give women the knowledge they would need to carry on a polite conversation if the subject of science should arise, these books framed mathematics, physics, biology and chemistry in ways that the authors felt women could understand—through the lens of romantic love. Compound these shoddy arguments and weak study materials with the practice of barring women from attending universities and there was a pretty good chance you would not have seen an overwhelming number of women studying calculus 200 years ago.

However, there was certainly one women determined to pursue her love for mathematics, and she is the subject of our Adventure in Feministory today.