Mary Somerville: Science, Illumination, and the Female Mind (Cambridge Science Biographies)
Cambridge University Press, 12/13/2001
EAN 9780521622998, ISBN10: 0521622999
Hardcover, 280 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm
Language: English
In an era when science was perceived as a male domain, Mary Somerville (1780–1872) became both the leading woman scientist of her day and an integral part of the British scientific community. She achieved this status through careful management of her gender identity and by creating rich, readable, and authoritative accounts of science that were rhetorically compelling, aesthetically satisfying, and valuable to the scientific community in the UK and abroad. This biography offers detailed analysis of the underlying patterns, themes, and rhetorical strategies of her major works and argues that Somerville employed a transcendent feminine style that retained the advantages but transcended the limitations usually associated with women's ways of knowing. The book advocates a new narrative for women's participation in science and demonstrates the many ways that gender relates to science and science functions in culture.
Author's preface
Prologue
Perceiving what others do not perceive
the 'peculiar illumination' of the female mind
1. Head among the stars, feet firm upon the earth
the problem of categorizing Mary Somerville
2. Creating a room of her own in the world of science
how Mary Fairfax became the famous Mrs Somerville
3. Science as exact calculation and elevated meditation
Mechanism of the Heavens (1931), Preliminary Dissertation (1832), and On the Connexion of the Physical Sciences (1834)
4. The earth, the sea, the air, and their inhabitants
Physical Geography (1848) and On Molecular and Microscopic Science (1869)
5. Personal Recollections (1973)
Mary Somerville on Mary Somerville
6. Memory and Mary Somerville
in the public eye and historical memory
Epilogue
science, voice, and vision.