Ada Lovelace Day is in memory of Ada King, daughter of the poet Lord Byron, who became Countess of Lovelace, and died in 1852. Her Automatic Engine is credited as being the first computer programme. The opportunity for this day is to give credit to women who inspired interest in science, maths and technology by blogging.
I love blogging, giving credit and sharing in a community so I was very interested when I found the information. But as for finding a woman who has inspired me .. that is a completely different matter. Firstly the only woman scientist I have really heard of (which is the point of the whole thing!) is Marie Curie .. and she has never interested me, so it would be wrong to wheel her out.
Then I asked a friend who is a professor of Acoustics and he talked about a woman who is president of the Royal Society and some others ..but using them would be like doing homework. I wanted to find someone who was amazing, that I had heard of but had forgotten. Even after some online research nobody jumped out at me. I don’t have to do this for homework – it is real, so it better be real for me.
Next I thought about women who inspired me where there was some scientific quality. Mary Wollestonecraft Shelley who wrote Frankenstein which is a bit scientific, George Eliot who I know was very interested in phrenology (the bumps on your head), Beatrix Potter with her interest in anatomy and botany. None seemed quite good enough. I love the paintings of Joseph Wright of Derby – lots of early scientific experiments and racked my brains to see if there were any women in the Lunar Society which was all about using science as a way of understanding life, rather than religion .. but there were none.
Then I thought about my own education. Was there an enthusiastic woman teacher of this stuff ever in my life? Maths was taught by men, (goodness – that is a strong subliminal message, isn’t it) the Biology teacher was incompetent and we used to mess around, chemistry was taught by a blue stocking spinster type – I remember finding her dull and a bit scary. Who taught Physics? That was the subject that I liked the most but I have absolutely no idea who taught me! No one comes to mind at all.
Until I started this thought process I hadn’t quite realised how badly science was represented by teachers. But in fact, we were very short-changed by inspirational teachers … one taught French and was fantastic, and while I was doing A level English we had two excellent teachers. But by that time I had made up my mind about which subjects I liked best. If there had been a lively science teacher somewhere in my past I think it would have made a huge difference.
Perhaps I should ask myself whether this is hopeless. Am I capable of being excited by science and technology? Am I meant to be doing this Ada Lovelace Day at all?
The answer is yes! My father describing the solar system using apples and oranges from the fruit bowl at supper, my boyfriend years ago talking about motherboards, the principles of database design and so on had me completely hooked even if I didn’t understand it all. I am fascinated today by using technology in websites .. but I have never been inspired by a woman. I think it has been more that it was a land I couldn’t enter.
If I am really honest the only people who have inspired me are my three daughters. They took to computer games like ducks to water, and are all technically competent even if not particularly interested. The finer details of CAD, Powerpoint, computer hardware or making films are no problem to them. They just assume they can do it, that there is no reason why not. So although I started by looking for some kind of heroine, I have ended up with the people I know best in my own life! Perfect.
They have a mother who supports them to do it, which was the hallmark of Ada Lovelace’s education. Her father (Byron) though a charismatic person was totally absent from Ada’s life, but her mother educated her about numbers and science. Probably the best kind of inspiration.
I must stop now and get to grips with my new Joomla site which was explained to me on Skype last night in a friendly hour and a half call with – yes – a geek in the US. Knowing who inspires me gives me more confidence that I can understand it all and make it work the way I want.
The fact that I have done this blog at all has been inspirational as I can see more clearly the influences on my life. I will read others’ blogs on Ada Lovelace Day about the women who inspire them, and, who knows, maybe by next year a real whole person who inspires me will have come into my life.
Trackbacks/Pingbacks