Skip to main content

Interviews

Recently, many publications and websites have carried interesting interviews with female mathematicians, among them the AWM and EWM newsletters. On this page you will find some general sources for interviews and also some interviews with individuals. Please let us know of other interviews which might be included.

General Sources for Interviews

American Mathematical Society

Women Doing Mathematics

This page contains a poster about some women mathematicians, with interviews and links to further resources.

Isaac Newton Institute

Six questions ....with women visiting the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences.   This is an occasional series of interviews with female mathematical scientists, showcasing the achievements of inspirational women from all kinds of backgrounds and at all stages of their mathematical sciences careers.

See also the Institute’s website section Supporting Women Mathematical Scientists.

AWM website

Many interesting interviews with women mathematicians can be found on the AWM website .

EWM website

women in math-portraits

A collection of portraits of women mathematicians, many extracted from EWM newsletters.

University of Nottingham

Women at the School of Mathematical Sciences at University of Nottingham have made some videos to make female mathematicians more visible and thus hopefully inspire others, to fight stereotypes, and to talk about what it is like to be a mathematician in academia today. And yes - it can be combined with having a family!

They also have a Facebook page of photos and profiles.

Women Mathematicians around the World

A collection of interviews with women mathematicians by Sylvie Paycha, 2013.

Sylvie  chaired the EMS Women in Maths Committee  for many years and set up the joint EWM/EMS Scientific Committee.

Interviews with Groups and Individuals

Sushama Agarwal

Ramanujan Institute for Advanced Study in Mathematics, Chennai.

This Mathematician Doesn’t Need to See the Board to Solve Problems. Sushama was born with a visual impairment but didn’t let it stop her from achieving her dream of becoming a mathematician. Interview by Nandita Jayaraj.  October 2016.

 

Female Mathematicians of Surathkal, Karnataka, India

The life of science: Lab-hopping across India. An interview with five female mathematicians from Surathkal. August 2016.

 

Laura DeMarco and Amie Wilkinson

Mathematics, Live: A conversation with Laura DeMarco and Amie Wilkinson

Evelyn Lamb of the University of Utah interviews Laura DeMarco and Amie Wilkinson. This  interview, in which these two prominent researchers talk about their experiences, was picked up by Scientific American (2013) and is one of a series being done for the AWM newsletter.

 

Joséphine Guidy-Wandja

Interview with Joséphine Guidy-Wandja of the University of Abidjan, the first African woman to obtain a PhD in mathematics. Find out more about Josephine Guidy-Wandja here.

 

Nalini Joshi

Nalini Joshi is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Sydney. Trixie Barretto, a filmmaker who also works at the University of Sydney, explains: ‘There’s a mathematician six floors above me where I work. I’d never had much to do with her, but I’d heard she’d had an unusual childhood in Burma, and grew up to become the first female professor of mathematics at the university where we both work. One day on Twitter she wrote, “Maths is in my heart,” a sentiment both alien and amusing to me, being someone who’s terrible with numbers. It stayed with me though, and later that afternoon I knocked on her door and asked if she’d tell me her story.

Watch Nalini’s Story (Video 2011)

 

Maryam Mirzakhani

Maryam Mirzakhani is a professor at Stanford University. Here is a 2008 interview with her in YouScribe. For news items about Maryam winning the 2014 Fields medal, see here.

 

Cheryl Praeger

Video interview with Cheryl Praeger, professor at the University of Western Australia. Find out more about Cheryl Praeger here.

 

Marta Sanz-Solé

Career interview with Marta Sanz-Sole, first female president of the European Mathematical Society. In +Plus magazine (2012). Find out more about Marta Sanz-Sole here.

 

Cora Sadosky

Entrevista a la Dra. Cora Sadosky: una matemática latina ejemplar.

Interview (Spanish) in MC++ Lo Nuevo En Matemáticas Computacionales (2002)

You can find a tribute to Cora Sadosky  here.

 

Caroline Series

Caroline Mary Series: Pearl of Hyperbolic Manifolds

Interview in Newsletter of Institute for Mathematical Sciences, National University of Singapore (2013). Find out more about Caroline Series here.

Interview with Professor Caroline Series

IMA Mathematics Today (2007).