Hidden Figures: Read. Watch. Discuss.
Discussion Guide to the Book with Questions for Each Chapter:
A Teacher's Guide to Hidden Figures. Wonderful guide from Harper Collins.
Discussion Guide with Questions by Theme:
Hidden Figures Family Discussion Guide. Excellent guide from Twentieth Century Fox.
For Instructors Who Can't Fit Another Thing In:
Some instructors want to use the book in their courses but don't have time to fit it in. Here's a time-efficient idea from Peggy Dodge, Early Childhood Education professor, who uses a format called "Book Clubs."
- Peggy gives students a choice of two books to read, Hidden Figures or The Bean Trees
- Students read book for homework over the course of the semester
- Four times during class, students break into groups to discuss the book they chose
- Before each of these four session, students write out their responses to questions that Peggy has prepared (Please see link below)
Curriculum Guides:
‘Hidden Figures’ Curriculum Brings Film’s Lessons To The Classroom Here are components of this curriculum guide:
When Computers Were Human by
Before Palm Pilots and iPods, PCs and laptops, the term "computer" referred to the people who did scientific calculations by hand. These workers were neither calculating geniuses nor idiot savants but knowledgeable people who, in other circumstances, might have become scientists in their own right. When Computers Were Human represents the first in-depth account of this little-known, 200-year epoch in the history of science and technology.
Call Number: QA303.2 .G75 2005ISBN: 9780691091570Publication Date: 2005-03-14
Hidden Human Computers: the Black Women of NASA by
Hidden Human Computers discusses how in the 1950s, black women made critical contributions to NASA by performing calculations that made it possible for the nation's astronauts to fly into space and return safely to Earth.
Call Number: QA27.5 .E39 2017ISBN: 9781680783872Publication Date: 2016-12-15
The Glass Universe by
The little-known true story of women's landmark contributions to astronomy. In the mid-nineteenth century, the Harvard College Observatory began employing women as calculators, or "human computers," to interpret the observations their male counterparts made via telescope each night. At the outset this group included the wives, sisters, and daughters of the resident astronomers, but soon the female corps included graduates of the new women's colleges--Vassar, Wellesley, and Smith. As photography transformed the practice of astronomy, the ladies turned from computation to studying the stars captured nightly on glass photographic plates. The "glass universe" of half a million plates that Harvard amassed over the ensuing decades--through the generous support of Mrs. Anna Palmer Draper, the widow of a pioneer in stellar photography--enabled the women to make extraordinary discoveries that attracted worldwide acclaim. They helped discern what stars were made of, divided the stars into meaningful categories for further research, and found a way to measure distances across space by starlight. Their ranks included Williamina Fleming, a Scottish woman originally hired as a maid who went on to identify ten novae and more than three hundred variable stars; Annie Jump Cannon, who designed a stellar classification system that was adopted by astronomers the world over and is still in use; and Dr. Cecilia Helena Payne, who in 1956 became the first ever woman professor of astronomy at Harvard--and Harvard's first female department chair. Elegantly written and enriched by excerpts from letters, diaries, and memoirs, The Glass Universe is the hidden history of the women whose contributions to the burgeoning field of astronomy forever changed our understanding of the stars and our place in the universe.
Call Number: QB34.5 .S63 2016ISBN: 9780670016952Publication Date: 2016-12-06
Distinguished African Americans in Aviation and Space Science by
"Distinguished African Americans in Aviation and Space Science" offers brief, readable entries that describe the lives and careers of 80 men and 20 women who defied poverty and prejudice to excel in the fields of aviation and space exploration. Each essay begins with birth and death dates, educational institutions attended and degrees earned, positions held, and awards won. A short summary of the individual's contribution to aviation or space science is followed by a biographical narrative divided into three sections: Early Years, Higher Education, and Career Highlights. Often based on the authors' correspondence with the subjects themselves, or with family members, this illustrated volume provides the fullest and most accessible biographical information available for many of these figures.
Call Number: TL539 .G83 2002ISBN: 9781573562461Publication Date: 2001-10-30
African Americans in Science, Math, and Invention by
Praise for the previous edition: "The scope is impressive...The information is well-written and accurate...[a] valuable reference...Recommended."—Library Media Connection "This book belongs in every high school library." American Reference Books Annual "...useful...a good addition to any school or public library that does not already have a concise overview of African American scientists in its collection." In research labs, university classrooms, NASA training facilities, and the administrative boardrooms of major institutions, African Americans have been important innovators, from early times to the present day. African Americans in Science, Math, and Invention, Revised Edition explores the many astronauts, physicists, chemists, biologists, agriculture specialists, and others who have dedicated their lives to improving humankind's knowledge and understanding of the universe. Each entry provides a biographical profile, surveying significant events in that person's life related to his or her accomplishments in these fields, followed by an up-to-date further reading list on that individual. A general introduction presents an overview of African-American contributions, subject indexes list individuals by year of birth and by fields of activity, and a general bibliography lists resources relevant to the topic. New and revised profiles include: Patricia Era Bath James Forten Bernard A. Harris Joan Higginbottom William B. Purvis John Brooks Slaughter Valerie Thomas Madame C.J. Walker.
Call Number: Q141 .S6285 2012ISBN: 9780816083312Publication Date: 2011-10-01
Rise of the Rocket Girls by
"If Hidden Figures has you itching to learn more about the women who worked in the space program, pick up Nathalia Holt's lively, immensely readable history, Rise of the Rocket Girls." --Entertainment Weekly The riveting true story of the women who launched America into space. In the 1940s and 50s, when the newly minted Jet Propulsion Laboratory needed quick-thinking mathematicians to calculate velocities and plot trajectories, they didn't turn to male graduates. Rather, they recruited an elite group of young women who, with only pencil, paper, and mathematical prowess, transformed rocket design, helped bring about the first American satellites, and made the exploration of the solar system possible. For the first time, Rise of the Rocket Girls tells the stories of these women--known as "human computers"--who broke the boundaries of both gender and science. Based on extensive research and interviews with all the living members of the team, Rise of the Rocket Girls offers a unique perspective on the role of women in science: both where we've been, and the far reaches of space to which we're heading.
Call Number: TL862.J48 H65 2016ISBN: 9780316338929Publication Date: 2016-04-05
Promised the Moon by
A female world-record-setting pilot, Jerrie Cobb was recruited in 1959 to take the astronaut tests. She excelled, so the doctor who supervised the selection of NASA's Mercury astronauts recruited additional female pilots. Twelve performed exceptionally. Stephanie Nolen tracked down eleven of the surviving "Fellow Lady Astronaut Trainees" and learned the story of those early days of the space race and the disappointment when, in 1961, the women were grounded.
Call Number: TL789.85 .A1 N65 2002BISBN: 9781568583198Publication Date: 2004-10-21
We Could Not Fail by
.The Space Age began just as the struggle for civil rights forced Americans to confront the long and bitter legacy of slavery, discrimination, and violence against African Americans. Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson utilized the space program as an agent for social change, using federal equal employment opportunity laws to open workplaces at NASA and NASA contractors to African Americans while creating thousands of research and technology jobs in the Deep South to ameliorate poverty. We Could Not Fail tells the inspiring, largely unknown story of how shooting for the stars helped to overcome segregation on earth. Richard Paul and Steven Moss profile ten pioneer African American space workers whose stories illustrate the role NASA and the space program played in promoting civil rights. They recount how these technicians, mathematicians, engineers, and an astronaut candidate surmounted barriers to move, in some cases literally, from the cotton fields to the launching pad. The authors vividly describe what it was like to be the sole African American in a NASA work group and how these brave and determined men also helped to transform Southern society by integrating colleges, patenting new inventions, holding elective office, and reviving and governing defunct towns. Adding new names to the roster of civil rights heroes and a new chapter to the story of space exploration, We Could Not Fail demonstrates how African Americans broke the color barrier by competing successfully at the highest level of American intellectual and technological achievement.
Call Number: TL521.312 .P39 2015ISBN: 9780292772496Publication Date: 2015-05-01
African American Women Chemists by
Dr. Marie Maynard Daly received her PhD in Chemistry from Columbia University in 1947. Although she was hardly the first of her race and gender to engage in the field, she was the first African American woman to receive a PhD in chemistry in the United States. In this book, Jeannette Brown, anAfrican American woman chemist herself, will present a wide-ranging historical introduction to the relatively new presence of African American women in the field of chemistry. It will detail their struggles to obtain an education and their efforts to succeed in a field in which there were fewAfrican American men, much less African American women.The book contains sketches of the lives of African America women chemists from the earliest pioneers up until the late 1960's when the Civil Rights Acts were passed and greater career opportunities began to emerge. In each sketch, Brown will explore women's motivation to study the field and detailtheir often quite significant accomplishments. Chapters focus on chemists in academia, industry, and government, as well as chemical engineers, whose career path is very different from that of the tradition chemist. The book concludes with a chapter on the future of African American women chemists,which will be of interest to all women interested in science.
Call Number: QD21 .B69 2012ISBN: 9780199742882Publication Date: 2011-12-14
Multiplication Is for White People by
Multiplication is for White People' is a passionate reminder that there is no achievement gap at birth. Poor teaching, negative stereotypes and a curriculum that does not adequately connect to poor children's lives conspire against the prospects of poor children of colour. From reception classes and on through the university years, Delpit brings the topic of educating other people's children into the twenty-first century, outlining a blueprint for raising expectations based on a simple premise: that all aspects of advanced education are for everyone.'
Call Number: LC213.2 .D45 2012ISBN: 9781595588982Publication Date: 2013-03-05
African Americans in Science by
This encyclopedia provides the most complete treatment to date of the accomplishments of African American scientists-and the struggles of African Americans to find their place in the scientific community. * Over 250 alphabetically organized entries covering the breadth of scientific achievements by African Americans, as well as the institutions and organizations dedicated to helping African Americans pursue scientific careers * An extensive bibliography of both print and online sources for further reading * Indexes organized by individual name and by discipline * Overview entries on issues such as scientific theories of race, the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, and African Americans in various scientific fields
Call Number: Q141 .C2138 2008ISBN: 9781851099986Publication Date: 2008-10-23
Black Inventors in the Age of Segregation by
According to the stereotype, late-nineteenth and early-twentieth-century inventors, quintessential loners and supposed geniuses, worked in splendid isolation and then unveiled their discoveries to a marveling world. Most successful inventors of this era, however, developed their ideas within the framework of industrial organizations that supported them and their experiments. For African American inventors, negotiating these racially stratified professional environments meant not only working on innovative designs but also breaking barriers. In this pathbreaking study, Rayvon Fouch#65533; examines the life and work of three African Americans: Granville Woods (1856-1910), an independent inventor; Lewis Latimer (1848-1928), a corporate engineer with General Electric; and Shelby Davidson (1868-1930), who worked in the U.S. Treasury Department. Detailing the difficulties and human frailties that make their achievements all the more impressive, Fouch#65533; explains how each man used invention for financial gain, as a claim on entering adversarial environments, and as a means to technical stature in a Jim Crow institutional setting. Describing how Woods, Latimer, and Davidson struggled to balance their complicated racial identities--as both black and white communities perceived them--with their hopes of being judged solely on the content of their inventive work, Fouch#65533; provides a nuanced view of African American contributions to--and relationships with--technology during a period of rapid industrialization and mounting national attention to the inequities of a separate-but-equal social order.
Call Number: T39 .F68 2003ISBN: 9780801882708Publication Date: 2005-08-05
"You have to believe in you first."
Michelle Obama, video, minute 37:57.
"The event features the stories of individuals who have made significant contributions to human space flight, space science, and innovation but who have not often had their stories told. The event also includes a Q&A with the cast and crew of the movie Hidden Figures." Michelle Obama gives an amazing speech starting at about minute 28. Margot Lee Shetterly introduces the First Lady starting at about minute 24.
From the Obama White House: National Archives and Records Administration.
"Left of Black" host Dr. Mark Anthony Neal sits down with author Margot Lee Shetterly to discuss her new book, Hidden Figures. From the John Hope Franklin Center at Duke University.
NASA commemorated the many contributions of retired mathematician Katherine Johnson to America’s space program during a building dedication ceremony on May 5, at the agency’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. Langley’s new Katherine G. Johnson Computational Research Facility was formally dedicated to the venerated mathematician and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient.
Johnson worked at Langley from 1953 until her retirement in 1986, beginning as a research mathematician -- part of a pool of women hired to perform mathematical equations and calculations by hand for engineers. She quickly distinguished herself and was permanently assigned to the branch that would later calculate the launch windows for NASA’s first Project Mercury flights.
Notable accomplishments include her computation, by hand, of the launch window and trajectory for Alan Shepard’s maiden space voyage aboard Freedom 7 in 1961, and verification, also by hand, of calculations made by the first computers for John Glenn's history-making orbit around the Earth in 1962. She also calculated the trajectory for the historic Apollo 11 first moon landing flight in 1969. From NASA.
President Obama awards the Presidential Medal of Freedom to seventeen recipients in the East Room of the White House on November 24, 2015. See especially minute 1:03, and, later, 30:24 for parts related to Katherine Johnson. From the Obama White House: National Archives and Records Administration.
NASA kicked off a yearlong centennial celebration for its Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, with events Dec. 1 highlighting the critical work done by the African American women of Langley’s West Computing Unit, a story told in the book and upcoming movie “Hidden Figures”. During a NASA education event that was streamed to schools across the country, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, Film director Ted Melfi, NASA Chief Historian Bill Barry, who consulted on the film, and NASA Modern Figure Julie Williams-Byrd, an electro-optics engineer for the Space Mission Analysis Branch at Langley, discussed the work of past and present NASA figures benefits humanity and enable future long-duration human and robotic exploration into deep space, including the agency’s Journey to Mars. From NASA. More NASA videos related to to African American themes.
Uploaded on Feb 25, 2011. An incredible conversation with a NASA Langley pioneer, Katherine Johnson, who worked at NASA Langley in Hampton during the 1950's—a woman and an African-American who broke through barriers and made history along the way. From WHRO, Hampton Roads, Virginia, PBS.
"Hidden Figures cast member Janelle Monáe (plays Mary Jackson) and Executive Producer Pharrell Williams, visited Google Atlanta to chat about their new film with computer science students from historically black colleges and universities and Googlers." From "Talks at Google."
"The Untold Story of the Space Race / WHAT'S NEXT?" Margot Lee Shetterly, Author, Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race with John Donvan. Published on Oct 6, 2016. From AtlanticLive, part of "The Atlantic." The whole interview is great, but check out the part at minute 23, when Ms. Shetterly discusses the differences between the movie and the book and the problem of people not believing that the whole "Hidde Figures" episode of history actually happened.
"Margot Lee Shetterly: The Black Women Who Helped Win the Space Race." An amazingly inspirational interview of Margot Lee Shetterly. Published on Dec 27, 2016. From the Chicago Humanities Festival. Key moments in this wonderful interview:
- For the importance of being open to new careers throughout your life, please see minute 18 through minutes 21.
- For the importance of failure in the sciences and in the writing process, please see minute 21 through minute 25. Key quotes from this section: "There is no improvement without failure." "Failure is your muse." "I am a big, big fan of re-writing."
"Soledad O’Brien hosted a panel on the importance of diversity in STEM fields, presented by IBM and featuring special guests from the Twentieth Century Fox film, ‘Hidden Figures,’ and leaders from the industry. Soledad was joined by Academy Award winner Octavia Spencer, the film’s director Theodore Melfi, Elizabeth Gabler (President Fox 2000 Pictures), Leah Gilliam (Girls Who Code), Rashid Ferrod Davis (P-TECH), Lindsay-Rae McIntyre (IBM Chief Diversity Officer) and Kristen Summers (Watson Public Sector)." From IBM. Published on Jan 15, 2017.
African Americans in the Classroom
"Cutting one way, these stories [such as Hidden Figures] do assist in deconstructing the White male math myth discourse—mathematics is not just for White (and Asian) boys and men. Cutting the other way, however, these histories too often become the 'exception story,' so to speak," David W. Stinton. Please see PDF below for entire article, which is from the December 2016 issue of Journal of Urban Mathematics Education.
Miriam Mann
"It was Miriam Mann who finally decided it was too much to take. 'There’s my sign for today,' she would say upon entering the cafeteria, spying the placard designating their table in the back of the room. Not even five feet tall, her feet just grazing the floor when she sat down, Miriam Mann had a personality as outsized as she was tiny." (Shetterly, Hidden Figures, Chapter 5).
How World War II opened the door for one of the first black women at NASA: In a photo submitted to Historically Black, a project by The Washington Post, Miriam Daniel Mann walks with purpose down a Hampton, Va., street in 1943, clutching a thick, hardcover book. She sports heels, a fashionable turban and a coat with two large buttons, the hemline of her plaid skirt peering out underneath. Mann, Harris' grandmother, was one of the first black female computers employed by NASA's predecessor,the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) ... (keep reading)
Magazine and Newspaper Articles
Notable and Diverse Role Models in STEM Recommended by Cheo Massion, Professor of English as a Second Language at College of Marin. "In Celebration of the Release of the Movie Hidden Figures, IBM and Vanity Fair Studios Profile Notable and Diverse Role Models in S.T.E.M."
Duchess Harris Explains the Politics of Possibility Recommended by Sara McKinnon, Professor of ESL at College of Marin. "By now, we all know the inspiring story—popularized by the Academy Award-nominated film “Hidden Figures”—of the Black women mathematicians who worked at NASA during the Space Race.
Duchess Harris, professor and chair of the American Studies department at Macalester College, knew this story inside and out long before it hit the theaters. In fact, she had grown up hearing about these women. That’s because her grandmother, Mariam D. Mann, was among the first Black women who started working NASA in the 1940s, decades before the film was set."
How History Forgot the Black Women Behind NASA's Space Race "In the 1940s, a group of female scientists were the human computers behind the biggest advances in aeronautics. Hidden Figures, an upcoming book and film tells their remarkable, untold story." A useful overview of the movie and book. "They never stopped trying to find ways, large and small, to expand the space for themselves and the people who came after them.” Margot Lee Shetterly, author.
The Nearly Forgotten Story... Overview of the book and movie, including quotes from the author, Margot Lee Shetterly.
Oscars Honor Real-Life NASA Hero Katherine Johnson, But Pass On 'Hidden Figures' Short article describing "Hidden Figures" wins and losses at the Oscars.
Calculating Women by Priyamvada Natarajan, Professor of Astronomy and Physics at Yale. A review of Hidden Figures and two related books. "Although the books by Sobel, Shetterly, and Holt are not polemical, they have an argument: science is not about singular discovery and invention. It is not an activity reserved for male geniuses working on their own. Discovery in almost every scientific field occurs through the collaboration of a large number of experts."
Why So Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics
From the American Association of University Women. "The number of women in science and engineering is growing, yet men continue to outnumber women, especially at the upper levels of these professions."
- 25 Years After McNair's Death
- Ronald McNair and a Segregated Library
- Ronald McNair Resisted in a Library African American Astrnauts - NASA
- Black Wings: African American Pioneers - Smithsonian
- 2017 NASA African American History Month Profile – Clifton T. Arnold, Jr , Stennis Space Center
- 2017 NASA African American History Month Profile Mark Davis, Armstrong Flight Research Center
- NASA Helped Kick-start Diversity in Employment Opportunities
What is it, anyway?
"Intersectionality, one of the foundational concepts within the social sciences, complicates traditional approaches toward the study of race, gender, class, and sexuality by treating these factors as interconnected variables that shape an individual's overall life experiences, rather than as isolated variables. Power, privilege, and oppression are often much more complex than has been traditionally thought, as an individual may be relatively privileged in one or more aspects of their life, while simultaneously experiencing prejudice, discrimination, or oppression stemming from other aspects of their social background or identity. Intersectionality seeks to explain how these different variables come together to shape experience, identity, and society." From García, Justin D. "Intersectionality." Research Starters: Sociology, January.
For a quick and clear explanation, watch Arshya Vahabzadeh's video created on Jan 20, 2015, for the Khan Academy.
Additional Resources:
- Intersectionality
Overview from Clark, C. (2013). Intersectionality. In P. L. Mason (Ed.), Encyclopedia of race and racism (2nd ed.). Farmington, MI: Gale. In MCC Library's Credo Reference database. - Female astronomers of colour face daunting discrimination"Two-fifths report feeling unsafe at work, and 18% have concerns about attending conferences....Women of colour working in astronomy and planetary science experience high rates of harassment at work, a study finds. In a survey, a striking 40% of these scientists reported feeling unsafe in their workplaces owing to their gender, and 28% reported feeling unsafe on account of their race." From "Nature," July 14, 2017
Click link above for Rachael Lallensack's easy to read overview of the study. For original research article by Clancy et al., please see below. Here are three useful concepts from this original article for discussing obstacles facing women of color:
"double jeopardy," as in this sentence from their introduction (Clancy et al., page 2): "Women of color experience double jeopardy where they are especially at risk for verbal and physical harassment compared to white women or men of color."
"multiple marginality," as in this sentence from their abstract (Clancy et al., page 1): "We hypothesized that the multiple marginality of women of color would mean that they would experience a higher frequency of inappropriate remarks, harassment, and assault in the astronomical and planetary science workplace."
"intersection," "insectional," "intersectionality," as in this sentence from their introduction (Clancy et al., page 2): "Here we expand upon the notion that harassment and assault persist across many science disciplines with an intersectional approach that looks at the targeting that can occur among those with multiple marginality, particularly the 'double jeopardy' frequently described for women of color, as well as those marginal due to their rank in a culture that can be very hierarchical."
"Now more than ever, it's important to look boldly at the reality of race and gender bias -- and understand how the two can combine to create even more harm. Kimberlé Crenshaw uses the term "intersectionality" to describe this phenomenon; as she says, if you're standing in the path of multiple forms of exclusion, you're likely to get hit by both. In this moving talk, she calls on us to bear witness to this reality and speak up for victims of prejudice." From TED. Published on Dec 7, 2016.
Click the image to compare the book with the film!