Hidden Figures details the lives of the African American women who were the computers for NACA, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, which later became NASA. Before reading this, I assumed that these women were relatively young and fresh out of college without families of there own, but I quickly learned that this was not true. One of the first women we meet is married with children of her own. She’s a teacher (as some of the other women are) and took extra jobs to […]
Celebrating Human Computers
One of the strongest arguments made in support of same-sex education relates to the benefits for girls. During the middle school years, pre-teens become more attuned to where they fit in the social order. For many girls, this means that being perceived to be “smart,” particularly in math and science, is not an asset. As such, they begin to “dumb down” in math and science to become more desirable to the male sex. It is no wonder, then, that I was thrilled that Hidden Figures […]
Hey I found this great new book no one has ever heard of!
So I liked this book a lot. Just getting that out of the way. Also, I haven’t seen the movie. Just getting THAT out of the way. So what could I possibly add to the conversation about this book and subsequently some sense of the movie? Probably not much. But here’s what I was thinking as I read it. This book is mostly not narrative. I mean this in the sense that there’s a lot of information about the lives of the women and men […]
Hidden Heroes of History
When it comes to nonfiction I prefer history and I prefer female centered stories most of the time (hence why my husband calls me a feminazi, he doesn’t actually know he’s a feminist even though I regularly explain that yes he is). So a book about awesome women in history related to the field I work in? Sign me up! Hidden Figures covers the work done by black female “computers” during the 1940’s – 1960’s at Langley first with the NACA and then NASA. Ms. […]