Archive
Oil and the “Chance Fate of the Unfortunate Individual”
The last week or so I’ve been reading that classic of naturalist writing, The Outermost House by Henry Beston, as the last of this year’s selections for the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society Book Club.
The book is a delight to read for those who love language – it is essentially one long prose poem. But at the same time, it is sweetly painful, as one takes the measure of all the glory that must have been lost in the time since Beston wrote.
Nothing quite prepared me, however, for encountering the following passage about halfway through the book, in the chapter titled “Winter Visitors”. Beston is described the birds that come to the Cape in winter – “a region which is to them a Florida”.
A new danger…now threatens the birds at sea. An irreducible residue of crude oil, called by refiners “slop,” remains in stills after oil distillation, and this is pumped into southbound tankers and emptied far offshore. This wretched pollution floats over large areas, and the birds alight in it and get it on their feathers. They inevitably die. Just how they perish is still something of a question. Some die of cold, for the gluey oil so mats and swabs the thick arctic feathering that creases open through it to the skin above the vitals; others die of hunger as well. Captain George Nickerson of Nauset tells me that he saw an oil-covered eider trying to dive for food off Monomoy, and that the bird was unable to plunge. I am glad to be able to write that the situation is better than it was. Five years ago, the shores of Monomoy peninsula were strewn with hundreds, even thousands, of dead sea fowl, for the tankers pumped out slop as they were passing the shoals – into the very waters, indeed, on which the birds have lived since time began! Today oil is more the chance fate of the unfortunate individual. But let us hope that all such pollution will presently end.
Oh, unfortunate individuals of the Gulf Coast, how I mourn for you and your “chance fate”. I suppose we can take heart that we are no longer purposefully discharging “slop” into the ocean – we aren’t, are we? – but it’s slim comfort.
But no matter. I heard a story on NPR the other day about how the oil slicks haven’t made it to the beaches of the Gulf Coast yet, so the white sands are still sparkly. And the state tourist bureaus are hard at work on ad development to reassure you that your vacation need not be ruined or delayed by any distressing sights on the beach; all is well! Out of sight, out of mind! The only oil you need to worry about is the tanning oil on the shapely young lass on the beach towel in this tourist ad! (There’s nothing female flesh can’t sell!) Come relax, spend your dollars, support our local tourist industry, and forget about the environment for awhile! It’s all good! Till it’s not.
The Arts as a Healing Balm for Mansplaining’s Psychic Ills
March is women’s history month, but don’t let that circumscribe your fun. You can get together with a posse of your like-minded women friends and mock mansplainers anytime. Now, I know many of you have just recently learned that there even existed a name you could attach to this annoying behavior plaguing your existence. Believe me, I know how important naming experience is – that’s why I have a whole category assigned to the topic. But your joy need not begin and end with just knowing that the craptastic manifestations you’ve been subjected to are (1) not your fault, (2) part of a larger system of patriarchy, and (3) mocked by many, many, many women all over the place.
No, you can have even more fun. Why not get together with a couple of good friends for movie night or a book club meeting? Get a nice bottle of wine (if you are a wine drinker) or a local microbrew or just make a nice pot of tea. You could order some tea from Premium Steap – they have awesome stuff, and it’s a woman-owned business.
So, let’s talk about two things – what to read or watch, and what to eat.
“The Madame Curie Complex” Sample Chapter: Part Three “Women in the Wild: Changing the Culture of Western Science”
This is the third and final part of a multi-part presentation of a sample chapter from a forthcoming book, The Madame Curie Complex. Part One can be found here. Part Two can be found here.
Recently I was approached with an offer to share with my readers a sample chapter from a forthcoming book called The Madame Curie Complex: The Hidden History of Women in Science. A caveat: I have not read the whole book, and offering the sample chapter here for you to read does not constitute an endorsement by me of the book. But I was sufficiently intrigued by the sample chapter I read to think it was worth sharing with you, to let you read if you want. You can make up your own minds and decide if you want to purchase the book, which is on offer at the Feminist Press site for a reasonable price. About the book:
This March, The Feminist Press will release The Madame Curie Complex: The Hidden History of Women in Science by historian Julie Des Jardins. The book tells the stories of women scientists, from Marie Curie to Maria Mayer, who took enormous chances and made great discoveries in spite of, and at times because of, the resistance they faced in a male-dominated field. Des Jardins compares their stories with prominent male counterparts in an exploration of whether, and how, women research, collaborate, and come to different conclusions about the natural world.
The chapter I have been given to share with you is chapter 7, The Lady Trimates and Feminist Science?: Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, and Biruté Galdikas. It came to me in a pdf version and a lot of formatting has been lost in moving it to this blog, but I hope you will still enjoy be able to enjoy reading it. I hope locating the footnotes will not be too hard. I’ve broken the chapter into sections for a series of posts, and the reference footnotes for each section will be at the end of each post.
On to the last section of the chapter…
“The Madame Curie Complex” Sample Chapter: Part Two “Louis Leakey’s ‘Primitive’ Feminism”
This is part two of a multi-part presentation of a sample chapter from a forthcoming book, The Madame Curie Complex. Part One can be found here. Part Three can be found here.
Recently I was approached with an offer to share with my readers a sample chapter from a forthcoming book called The Madame Curie Complex: The Hidden History of Women in Science. A caveat: I have not read the whole book, and offering the sample chapter here for you to read does not constitute an endorsement by me of the book. But I was sufficiently intrigued by the sample chapter I read to think it was worth sharing with you, to let you read if you want. You can make up your own minds and decide if you want to purchase the book, which is on offer at the Feminist Press site for a reasonable price. About the book:
This March, The Feminist Press will release The Madame Curie Complex: The Hidden History of Women in Science by historian Julie Des Jardins. The book tells the stories of women scientists, from Marie Curie to Maria Mayer, who took enormous chances and made great discoveries in spite of, and at times because of, the resistance they faced in a male-dominated field. Des Jardins compares their stories with prominent male counterparts in an exploration of whether, and how, women research, collaborate, and come to different conclusions about the natural world.
The chapter I have been given to share with you is chapter 7, The Lady Trimates and Feminist Science?: Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, and Biruté Galdikas. It came to me in a pdf version and a lot of formatting has been lost in moving it to this blog, but I hope you will still enjoy be able to enjoy reading it. I hope locating the footnotes will not be too hard. I’ve broken the chapter into sections for a series of posts, and the reference footnotes for each section will be at the end of each post.
On to the second section of the chapter…
“The Madame Curie Complex” Sample Chapter: Part One
This is part one of a multi-part presentation of a sample chapter from a forthcoming book, The Madame Curie Complex. Part Two can be found here. Part Three can be found here.
This is something a little different for TSZ. Recently I was approached with an offer to share with my readers a sample chapter from a forthcoming book called The Madame Curie Complex: The Hidden History of Women in Science. A caveat: I have not read the whole book, and offering the sample chapter here for you to read does not constitute an endorsement by me of the book. But I was sufficiently intrigued by the sample chapter I read to think it was worth sharing with you, to let you read if you want. You can make up your own minds and decide if you want to purchase the book, which is on offer at the Feminist Press site for a reasonable price. About the book:
This March, The Feminist Press will release The Madame Curie Complex: The Hidden History of Women in Science by historian Julie Des Jardins. The book tells the stories of women scientists, from Marie Curie to Maria Mayer, who took enormous chances and made great discoveries in spite of, and at times because of, the resistance they faced in a male-dominated field. Des Jardins compares their stories with prominent male counterparts in an exploration of whether, and how, women research, collaborate, and come to different conclusions about the natural world.
The chapter I have been given to share with you is chapter 7, The Lady Trimates and Feminist Science?: Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, and Biruté Galdikas. It came to me in a pdf version and a lot of formatting has been lost in moving it to this blog, but I hope you will still enjoy be able to enjoy reading it. I hope locating the footnotes will not be too hard. I’ve broken the chapter into sections for a series of posts, and the reference footnotes for each section will be at the end of each post.
The chapter opens with two quotes:
We think of science as manipulation, experiment, and quantification done by men dressed in white coats, twirling buttons and watching dials in laboratories. When we read about a woman who gives funny names to chimpanzees and then follows them into the bush, meticulously recording their every grunt and groom, we are reluctant to admit such activity into the big leagues. We may admire Goodall’s courage, fortitude, and patience but wonder if she represents forefront science or a dying gasp from the old world of romantic exploration. . . . The conventional stereotype is so wrong. . . . Jane Goodall’s work with chimpanzees represents one of the Western world’s great scientific achievements.
–Stephen Jay Gould, Introduction to the revised edition of In the Shadow of Man1
Often I think of science in technological terms–of the cold machinery, the devices, and accelerators, the weapons that science makes possible–all the things that modern science creates and utilizes. However, one day, I thought of science and appreciated its intent to look more closely into the beauty and mystery of nature. I had a glimpse of science in a different light, and at that moment the image of the woman in my dream came to mind. In one view of science the image exists of the male scientist exerting power and control over passive female nature. In this view the practice of science is seen as a violation of the natural world. However, my dream image raised the possibility of an alternative view. I began to consider another generative impulse of pure science–one born of curiosity and the love of nature. Then the woman becomes an intriguing symbol of a new way for me to think about the practice of science and its nature. She embodies the sense of science as the desire to understand nature, pursued in a rational and imaginative way. . . . Science is then not about the power of (male) intellect over passive (female) embodied nature. Rather science is a marriage, the relationship between human intellect and the intelligibility of a dynamic nature–nature which is both mysterious and knowable and in whose knowing we learn something about ourselves.
–Mary Palevsky, Atomic Fragments, April 19972
1. Jane Goodall, In the Shadow of Man (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971), 5.
2. Mary Palevsky, Atomic Fragments: A Daughter’s Questions (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), 238.
On to the chapter…
“The Myth of Black Disingenuity”: Exploring the Intersection of African American History and the History of Technology
I failed to produce this post in time for DNLee’s Diversity in Science carnival – Black History Month: Broadening STEM Participation at Every Level. That’s mostly because I had a bunch of personal stuff going on in the past couple weeks that just wouldn’t leave me alone. I think I’ll be back to more regular blogging now.
You might have already read my brief post on Hercules, the chef enslaved by George Washington who eventually escaped to freedom. In it I noted “It was no small thing to be a chef under such circumstances, and the degree of technical skill required was surely astonishing.” Even the highest tech 18th century kitchen still demanded a range and depth of technical competence that today’s average pampered cook just can’t imagine.
When I read about Hercules in that fantastic set of articles in the Philadelphia Inquirer, I might not have given much thought to the degree of technical skill he must have possessed to turn out state dinners in such circumstances. What put me in the state of mind to ponder such matters was a book I had recently begun browsing: A Hammer in Their Hands: A Documentary History of Technology and the African-American Experience, ed. Carroll Pursell. This book would be worth its price if only for the introductory essay which contextualizes the collection of primary sources that follows with the intersection of African-American history and the history of technology, all in a few short pages. Pursell speaks of the “prehistories” of these fields, and notes the following:
Skloot, “Immortal Life” Featured on “Fresh Air” Today
Be sure to catch Fresh Air whenever it airs in your local market to day, or catch the podcast. Rebecca Skloot is on today, talking about her book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which, as I hope you know, is released today. And I hope you pre-ordered your copy already. Fresh Air is on at 3 pm and again at 7 pm in Philly – can’t wait!
UPDATE: Terry Gross may just be the perfect person to interview Rebecca Skloot, who is wonderfully telling the story of Henrietta Lacks, and of how she came to tell the story of Henrietta Lacks. If you don’t get to listen to Fresh Air on the radio, listen to it on the web. And then go donate some money to your local public radio station. And then go buy Rebecca’s book, if you haven’t already.
Bunny Rock in Zuska’s Garden
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