Well, it's February which is Black History Month. Woodrow Wilson started it to recognize the importance of black history in American history. After all, African-Americans did much of the work to power America's economy and fought in all of America's most important wars, including the Revolutionary War. Also, I'm pretty certain that most genres of American music were pioneered by African-American musicians (e.g. jazz, blues, R&B, gospel, rock, funk, pop, hip-hop).Today, I realized something peculiar. At Harvard, there is not a single black mathematics professor. In fact, I only know one math researcher who is black but he is not a descendant of American slaves. Harvard's physics department is not any different. I think there's one who is sort of affiliated with them (Andrew Kiruluta) but I'm also assuming (from his last name) he is not a descendant from American slaves either. I wouldn't be surprised if the lack of black representation in the other science departments at Harvard is common.
Why would this be? Is Harvard discriminating against black scientists? I don't think so. The harsh truth is that there aren't as many black scientists as there are white and Asian (very broadly speaking to include South Asian and Middle Eastern) scientists.
Quickly, without using Google or Wikipedia, name as many renowned black scientists as you can. I only came up with three: George Washington Carver (inventor, botantist, polymath), Neil deGrasse Tyson (astrophysicist at the Hayden Planetarium), and Sylvester James Gates Junior (theoretical physicist working on superstring theory). I think part of the problem is that black scientists are hardly ever mentioned or given any recognition. Many black Americans don't have scientific role models and instead revere the musicians, actors, and athletes.
To illustrate, let me tell you a quick story. A former house tutor of mine worked as a high school teacher in DC. He told me that when he asked his students (most of whom were black) what they wanted to be when they grew up, they said they wanted to either:
A) Play in the NBA
B) Play in the NFL
C) Become a famous hip-hop artist
He then went on to teach them how to calculate the probability of making it to the NBA or NFL. The get a rough estimate for the NBA, divide the number of NBA players by the number of aspiring high school basketball players. If you work it out, it's essentially zero.
Now, there is nothing wrong with going into the entertainment industry. However, to make it big in entertainment is extremely difficult and lot of luck is involved. It would be more realistic for more young black high school students to continue their studies in math and science.
Personally, I think Neil deGrasse Tyson is amazing. He is clearly passionate about popularizing science and he is a great example of a role model for young African-Americans. He will be hosting the new sequel to Carl Sagan's Cosmos and I think that will have a very positive impact.
You may want to ask both Noam Elkies of Harvard maths department and Jonathan Farley why Dr. Farley was never hired by Harvard as he so wanted.
ReplyDeleteYou met Farley that one evening when you and I ran into each at the COOP with Kenneth.
For those unacquanited with Dr. Farley,
http://www.math.buffalo.edu/mad/PEEPS/farley_jonathan.html
and his personal website
http://www.latticetheory.net/
I think the main problem with that has to do with the Harvard math department's lack of diversity in research areas (compared to MIT's or Berkeley's). Professor Farley's interests are not of huge interest at Harvard. In fact, according to U.S. News & Report, Harvard doesn't even rank among the top discrete math programs (like lattice theory).
ReplyDeleteAt Harvard, algebraists seem to dominate, then topologists, then geometers, then maybe analysts. Harvard is very concerned with the theory-building from the Bourbaki tradition.