A recent article in THE SCIENTIST called upon readers to question reports of shortages of scientists and engineers (“Science Shortages: Real or Not?,” Edith. Fairman Cooper August 10, 1987, p. 30). Whatever, the employment patterns are for mathematicians, 19 percent of doctorates in the field currently are awarded to women. Over the past 20 years this figure has nudged upward from a steady 5 percent for the three previous decades. If indeed there is a shortage of mathematicians (university employers think there is), an obvious untapped resource lies in the female population, which has been overlooked for generations as a source of mathematical talent. Changing the situation has required diligent efforts by the women already in the field. In the past, information on women mathematicians had to be gleaned from scattered sources, many of which were inaccurate or sketchy. Louise Grinstein and Paul Campbell’s Women of Mathematics collects, in one ...
Rich, Informative and Welcome Collection
WOMEN OF MATHEMATICS A Biobibliographic Sourcebook. Louise S. Grinstein and Paul J. Campbell, eds. Greenwood Press, Westport, CT, 1987. 292 pp. $45. A recent article in THE SCIENTIST called upon readers to question reports of shortages of scientists and engineers (“Science Shortages: Real or Not?,” Edith. Fairman Cooper August 10, 1987, p. 30). Whatever, the employment patterns are for mathematicians, 19 percent of doctorates in the field currently are awarded to women. Over the pa
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