“Obviously Bold.” A Feminist Generation Keeps Marching

“Obviously Bold.” A Feminist Generation Keeps Marching

Pod­cast tran­scripts Wel­come to Math! Sci­ence! His­to­ry! I’m Gabrielle Bir­chak, your host. For Women’s His­to­ry Month, I want­ed to fea­ture one bril­liant thing, one clean win, and one woman whose work still qui­et­ly runs the world, even if most of us do not real­ize it. Today’s “one bril­liant thing” was a sort­ing sys­tem. A clas­si­fi­ca­tion scheme. A way to take the universe,

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PODCASTHON SPECIAL! Espwa Means Hope

PODCASTHON SPECIAL! Espwa Means Hope

Today, while we are still cel­e­brat­ing Wom­en’s His­to­ry Month, Math! Sci­ence! His­to­ry! is tak­ing part in the the char­i­ty dri­ve through Pod­casthon, as we inter­view Ang­ie Mal­don­a­do, the founder of Esp­wa Means Hope!  https://youtu.be/VUKcnqnZWA4 Please help to make a dif­fer­ence by donat­ing to EspwaMeansHopeHaiti.org — every pen­ny you donate goes to build­ing a com­mu­ni­ty with wom­en’s health care, edu­ca­tion for children,

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Flashcards! Science Needs Fiction

Flashcards! Science Needs Fiction

Sci­ence fic­tion is not valu­able because it pre­dicts the future. It is valu­able because it trains the mind. It gives us a way to prac­tice think­ing about sys­tems before we build them, and to prac­tice car­ing about con­se­quences before con­se­quences have real names.

Flashcards! The Archive that Survives

Flashcards! The Archive that Survives

If you have ever felt your stom­ach drop when you’ve lost a file on your com­put­er, then you already under­stand the first les­son of his­to­ry. His­to­ry is not only made by peo­ple. His­to­ry is also made by what survives. 

FLASHCARDS! Look in the Margins

FLASHCARDS! Look in the Margins

this episode is about read­ing with depth and deter­mi­na­tion to find the accu­rate sources behind the suc­cess sto­ries. The pat­tern is not only that black female inven­tors were over­looked; it is also the way in which the over­look­ing occurs.

FLASHCARDS! Self-Taught Is a Skill

FLASHCARDS! Self-Taught Is a Skill

It’s Flash­cards Fri­day! This pod­cast is a fol­low-up to Tuesday’s episode about Ben­jamin Ban­nek­er. This bril­liant indi­vid­ual was pre­dom­i­nant­ly self-taught. I found his sto­ry very inspir­ing because he was self-edu­­cat­ed. In oth­er words, he learned every­thing he knew about astron­o­my and sur­vey­ing with­out being in a class­room. And today, when peo­ple say they are self-taught, that means so more than

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Benjamin Banneker, the Black Authority that Shaped DC

Benjamin Banneker, the Black Authority that Shaped DC

The nation spoke in the lan­guage of lib­er­ty, but it had been built to deny lib­er­ty. It praised rea­son, but it fenced rea­son off by race. Yet here was a self-taught Black astronomer doing pre­cise fed­er­al work for the cap­i­tal of the Unit­ed States.