Jackie Mitchell

#44/100 in #100extraordinarywomen

Some 85 years before modern pro ball started welcoming women to its ranks, a young southpaw from Memphis was knocking on the glass ceiling. Virne Beatrice "Jackie" Mitchell Gilbert was one of the first female pitchers in professional baseball history. Pitching for the Chattanooga Lookouts Class AA minor league baseball team in an exhibition game against the New York Yankees, she struck out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in succession and then was fired for it.

Jackie was born on August 29, 1913 in Chattanooga, Tennessee, to Virne Wall Mitchell and Dr. Joseph Mitchell. When she learned how to walk, her father took her to the baseball diamond and taught her the basics of the game. Her next door neighbor, Dazzy Vance, taught her to pitch and showed her his "drop ball", a type of breaking ball. Vance was a major league pitcher and would eventually be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. At the age of 16, Jackie began playing for the Engelettes, a women's team in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and went on to attend a baseball training camp in Atlanta, Georgia. In doing so she attracted the attention of Joe Engel, the so-called “Barnum of Baseball,” the president and owner of the Chattanooga Lookouts, who was known for using publicity stunts as a way to draw crowds during the Great Depression. Seeing her as an opportunity to draw attention to the Lookouts, he signed 17-year-old Jackie to the team on March 25, 1931. She appeared in her first professional game on April 2, 1931 becoming only the second woman to play organized baseball behind Lizzie Arlington who pitched for the Reading Coal Heavers against the Allentown Peanuts in a Minor league game in 1898. At that time, little did Engel know Ms. Mitchell would prove much more than a sideshow act.

On April 2, the major league New York Yankees took a detour on their way home from spring training to play a scrimmage against the minor league Lookouts. Press coverage of the young woman recently signed to Engel’s club was snide: “She swings a mean lipstick,” wrote one paper. “The curves won’t be all on the ball when pretty Jackie Mitchell takes the mound,” another outlet lamely quipped. Critics were shut up in short order, though: The Lookouts’ starting pitcher was yanked after facing just two batters, which brought Mitchell in to face the meat of the Bronx Bombers’ order. First up? Babe Ruth.

Tony Horwitz of the Smithsonian recounts the first at-bat: “Ruth let the first pitch pass for a ball. At Mitchell’s second offering, Ruth ‘swung and missed the ball by a foot.’ He missed the next one, too, and asked the umpire to inspect the ball. Then, with the count 1–2, Ruth watched as Mitchell’s pitch caught the outside corner for a called strike three. Flinging his bat down in disgust, he retreated to the dugout.” As Babe Ruth glared and verbally abused the umpire before being led away by his teammates to sit to wait for another batting turn, the crowd roared for Jackie. Next up was Lou Gehrig, another all-time great. Mitchell fanned him on three straight pitches. Though the Yankees would go on to thrash the Lookouts 14–4, Mitchell had made her point. One journalist wrote the next day, “The prospect grows gloomier for misogynists.” Jackie Mitchell became famous for striking out two of the greatest baseball players in history.

Predictably, the national male psyche in 1931 was wholly unprepared for a successful female ballplayer. Ruth, upset by the event, told reporters that “Women will never make good in baseball” because they “are too delicate. It would kill them to play every day.” The Sultan of Swat’s words found a home in the ear of baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis, who voided Jackie Mitchell’s contract on the dubious assertion that the sport was too physically tough for women. She would join several other unofficial pro leagues before retiring and joining the family business. 

Jackie continued to play professionally, barnstorming with the House of David, a men's team famous for their very long hair and long beards. While travelling with the House of David team, she would sometimes wear a fake beard for publicity. She retired in 1937 at the age of 23 after becoming furious since her story about playing baseball was being used something of a side show – once being asked to pitch while riding a donkey. She refused to come out of retirement when the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League formed in 1943. Major League Baseball would formally ban the signing of women to contracts on June 21, 1952. The ban lasted 40 years until 1992 when Carey Schueler was drafted by the Chicago White Sox for the 1993 season. Meanwhile, in 1982, Jackie was invited to throw out the ceremonial first pitch for the Chattanooga Lookouts on their season opening day. 

Jackie Mitchell died in Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, on January 7, 1987, and was buried in Forest Hills Cemetery in Chattanooga. Though her career lacked longevity, it certainly burned bright for a brief moment. After all, she struck out the Great Bambino and the Iron Horse. How many can say that? 

Source: Google search and Wikipedia.

Laxmi

#43/100 in #100extraordinarywomen

Laxmi, who chooses to go only by her first name, is an Indian campaigner with Stop Acid Attacks and a TV host. She is an acid attack survivor and speaks for the rights of acid attack victims. She was attacked in 2005 at age 15, by a 32-year-old man whose advances she had rejected. She is also an active advocate against acid attacks and has taken her fight forward by gathering 27,000 signatures for a petition to curb acid sales, and taking that cause to the Indian Supreme Court. Her petition led the Supreme Court to order the central and state governments to regulate the sale of acid, and the Parliament to make prosecutions of acid attacks easier to pursue. She is currently the director of Chhanv Foundation, a NGO dedicated to help the survivors of acid attacks in India. 

Her story is that of amazing grit and indomitable will. Laxmi was born in 1990 in New Delhi in a middle-class family. Her face and other body parts were disfigured in the said acid attack. A minor then, Laxmi was attacked with acid by three persons near Tughlaq road in New Delhi as she had refused to marry one of them. She spotted 32-year-old Naeem Khan, one of her friend’s brothers, as she was shopping in Khan Market, South Delhi, but suddenly, the woman he was with pushed me to the ground and a cold liquid splashed across Laxmi's face, causing an unimaginable burning sensation. Laxmi rolled around on the dirty city street in a desperate bid to stop the pain until eventually a local taxi driver came forward to help, throwing water over her face. The taxi driver rushed Laxmi to nearby Safdarjang Hospital, shouting “acid attack” encouraging people to move out of the way. It was only then that Laxmi realised what had happened. She said: “I felt as if someone had set my whole body on fire. The skin was just coming off, it was like dripping, from my hands and from my face.” She has undergone nine major surgeries to try and reduce the burns to her skin since the horrific attack in a busy market in 2005 - and the last left her on a ventilator for four days.

Now, Laxmi feels an overwhelming strength to change the acid attacks that continue to happen in India in a bid to help her daughter grow up in a safer country. She later filed a PIL seeking framing of a new law, or amendment to the existing criminal laws like IPC, Indian Evidence Act and CrPC for dealing with the offence, besides asking for compensation. She had also pleaded for a total ban on sale of acid, citing increasing number of incidents of such attacks on women across the country. During a hearing in April, the Centre had assured the Supreme Court of India that it will work with the state governments to formulate a plan before the next hearing. However, when the Centre failed to produce a plan, the Supreme Court warned that it will intervene and pass orders if the government failed to frame a policy to curb the sale of acid in order to prevent chemical attacks. “Seriousness is not seen on the part of government in handling the issue,” the bench headed by Justice RM Lodha had said. The court also directed the Centre to convene a meeting of Chief Secretaries of all states and Union Territories to hold discussion for enacting a law to regulate the sale of acids and a policy for treatment, compensation and care and rehabilitation of such victims.

Meanwhile, in 2013, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of Laxmi and Rupa’s plea, thereby creating a fresh set of restrictions on the sale of acid. Under the new regulations, acid could not be sold to any individual below the age of 18 years. One is also required to furnish a photo identity card before buying acid. Laxmi claims that not much has changed on the ground, despite all the regulations. “Acid is freely available in shops. Our own volunteers have gone and purchased acid easily. In fact, I have myself purchased acid,” she said. “We have launched a new initiative called ‘Shoot Acid’. By means of the Right to Information Act, we are trying to acquire data concerning the sale of acid in every district. We intend to present the information collected through this initiative before the Supreme Court to apprise them of the situation on the ground.”

On personal front, she had once given up on finding a partner thanks to the stares and comments she received in public left her too ashamed to leave the home, but went on to find love through her campaigning work to stop other women suffering the same fate. Laxmi began working with the charity Stop Acid Attacks and through it met founder Alok Dixit, with whom she found love. Although the attack has left its mental scars, she said she is no longer ashamed of the physical scars. She said: “After the attack, I never thought I would ever find a soulmate. I had lost hope. But in Alok, I couldn't have found anyone better. He understood the kind of pain I was in. He understood what I had been going through. He wasn’t like other men my age – he was completely committed to the campaign and making a change in life, and I fell for that. I never told him, though. But then three months after we first met, while we were working one afternoon, Alok admitted he had feelings for me. He said he’d fallen for my courage and spirit.” The couple, however, are challenging society norms by not getting married. “We have decided to live together until we die. But we are challenging the society by not getting married,” Laxmi said. Alok added: “We are not going to follow the norms that the society approves of. We will prove that our love does not need a name. Our love is about understanding and support.” Laxmi and Alok continue to work together helping and supporting many survivors of acid attacks in India, and last year they launched the Sheroes Hangout, which is a café, in Agra, run by victims of acid attacks. 

Laxmi and Alok are now proud parents of a baby girl whom they have named Pihu. Although thrilled, she revealed that she was terrified of how her child would react to her injuries. As her daughter Pihu celebrates her first birthday, Laxmi said: “I was overjoyed but I started to worry – how would my child react to my face? Would they be scared of me, or find it difficult to bond with me? I tried to enjoy my pregnancy but these thoughts would fill my head and I worried how I would cope once I gave birth.” But when Pihu arrived the following April, Laxmi's fears became a distant memory. “The moment we locked eyes, I loved her more than anything in the world. Sometimes I struggle to believe something so beautiful is a part of me – it’s a happiness I never thought I’d feel,” she said. “I never imagined that I would become a mother. It’s nature’s gift. It has brought inexplicable happiness. I see her and think how can something so beautiful be my daughter? It’s a happiness I never thought I’d feel.” Now, Laxmi feels an overwhelming strength to change the acid attacks that continue to happen in India in a bid to help her daughter grow up in a safer country. She added: “I’ve already decided that, when the time is right, I will tell Pihu about what happened to me. It's not a nice story and I worry about that day. But I will not tell her my story until she asks. Only when she asks me why I look the way I do, will I tell her my real life story. I don’t want her to hear about it from anyone else. It’s my story and I will have to explain to her what happened to me. I just hope my charity work will help protect my daughter from any type of attack in the future. She will see survivors throughout her life on every level, daily. And she will witness the struggles her own parents go through to build a better future but we will not give up, we will keep fighting for change a better life.”

In March 2014, Laxmi was invited to the International Woman of Courage Celebration in Washington DC by Michelle Obama. She was one of 10 women honoured for courageous and selfless efforts advocating for peace, justice, human rights and women’s equality – often in the face of great personal risk. And on her return home, she was offered her own weekly talk show (called Udaan) for acid-attack survivors on Indian TV channel News Express. Then, in January she was named as the star of an India designer's clothing campaign called the 'Face of Courage' and said she wants to show other women who have been attacked to have courage. She was also chosen as the NDTV Indian of the Year (LIC Unsung Hero of the Year) for the year 2013. 

Source: Google search and Wikipedia.

Hypatia of Alexandria

#42/100 of #100extraordinarywomen

Hypatia of Alexandria is not like my usual entry to this blog. But I must confess that Hypatia intrigued me much more than any woman I have already shared about. For one, we are not talking about the 19th or the 20th century here; we are talking about the 4th century. It is amazing that while we women are struggling to make a mark for ourselves in the 20th century, Hypatia stood out among the men and was well respected and acknowledged in 4th century. What is sad though is that, not many could digest that and she suffered for no fault of hers. Still, even to this day, she is revered as "symbol of virtue" even by the Christians who in a way were responsible for her Death. The contemporary Christian historian Socrates of Constantinople described her in his Ecclesiastical History: "There was a woman at Alexandria named Hypatia, daughter of the philosopher Theon, who made such attainments in literature and science, as to far surpass all the philosophers of her own time. Having succeeded to the school of Plato and Plotinus, she explained the principles of philosophy to her auditors, many of whom came from a distance to receive her instructions. On account of the self-possession and ease of manner which she had acquired in consequence of the cultivation of her mind, she not infrequently appeared in public in the presence of the magistrates. Neither did she feel abashed in going to an assembly of men. For all men on account of her extraordinary dignity and virtue admired her the more."

Hypatia of Alexandria was a Greek mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher in Egypt, then a part of the Byzantine Empire. She was the head of the Neoplatonic school at Alexandria, where she taught philosophy and astronomy. This is her story.

One day on the streets of Alexandria, Egypt, in the year 415 or 416, a mob of Christian zealots led by Peter the Lector accosted a woman’s carriage and dragged her from it and into a church, where they stripped her and beat her to death with roofing tiles. They then tore her body apart and burned it. Who was this woman and what was her crime? Hypatia was one of the last great thinkers of ancient Alexandria and one of the first women to study and teach mathematics, astronomy and philosophy. Though she is remembered more for her violent death, her dramatic life is a fascinating lens through which we may view the plight of science in an era of religious and sectarian conflict.

To understand Hypatia, one must first understand Alexandria, the setting, the city, which first bolstered her talent and then destroyed it. Founded by Alexander the Great in 331 B.C., the city of Alexandria quickly grew into a center of culture and learning for the ancient world. At its heart was the museum, a type of university, whose collection of more than a half-million scrolls was housed in the library of Alexandria. Alexandria underwent a slow decline beginning in 48 B.C., when Julius Caesar conquered the city for Rome and accidentally burned down the library. (It was then rebuilt.) By 364, when the Roman Empire split and Alexandria became part of the eastern half, the city was beset by fighting among Christians, Jews and pagans. Further civil wars destroyed much of the library's contents. The last remnants likely disappeared, along with the museum, in 391, when the archbishop Theophilus acted on orders from the Roman emperor to destroy all pagan temples. Theophilus tore down the temple of Serapis, which may have housed the last scrolls, and built a church on the site.

The last known member of the museum was the mathematician and astronomer Theon — Hypatia's father. Some of Theon's writing has survived. His commentary (a copy of a classical work that incorporates explanatory notes) on Euclid's Elements was the only known version of that cardinal work on geometry until the 19th century. But little is known about his and Hypatia's family life. Even Hypatia's date of birth is contested — scholars long held that she was born in 370 but modern historians believe 350 to be more likely. The identity of her mother is a complete mystery, and Hypatia may have had a brother, Epiphanius, though he may have been only Theon's favorite pupil. Theon taught mathematics and astronomy to his daughter, who studied in Athens and who later collaborated on some of his commentaries. It is thought that Book III of Theon's version of Ptolemy's Almagest — the treatise that established the Earth-centric model for the universe that wouldn't be overturned until the time of Copernicus and Galileo — was actually the work of Hypatia.

She was a mathematician and astronomer in her own right, writing commentaries of her own and teaching a succession of students from her home. Around 400, she became head of what is now known as the Neoplatonist School in Alexandria, where she imparted the knowledge of Plato and Aristotle to students, including pagans, Christians, and foreigners. Letters from one of these students, Synesius, indicate that these lessons included how to design an astrolabe, a kind of portable astronomical calculator that would be used until the 19th century. Beyond her father's areas of expertise, Hypatia established herself as a philosopher in the Neoplatonic school, a belief system in which everything emanates from the One. (Her student Synesius would become a bishop in the Christian church and incorporate Neoplatonic principles into the doctrine of the Trinity.) Her public lectures were popular and drew crowds. 

No written work widely recognized by scholars as Hypatia's own has survived to the present time. Many of the works commonly attributed to her are believed to have been collaborative works with her father, Theon Alexandricus. This kind of authorial uncertainty is typical for female philosophers in antiquity. A partial list of Hypatia's works as mentioned by other antique and medieval authors or as posited by modern authors:

• A commentary on the 13-volume Arithmetica by Diophantus.
• A commentary on the Conics of Apollonius of Perga.
• Edited the existing version of Ptolemy's Almagest. "Until recently scholars thought that Hypatia revised Theon's commentary on Almagest. The view was based on the title of the commentary on the third book of Almagest, which read: "Commentary by Theon of Alexandria on Book III of Ptolemy's Almagest, edition revised by my daughter Hypatia, the philosopher." Cameron, who analyzed Theon's titles for other books of Almagest and for other scholarly texts of late antiquity, concludes that Hypatia corrected not her father's commentary but the text of Almagest itself. Thus, the extant text of Almagest could have been prepared, at least partly, by Hypatia".
• Edited her father's commentary on Euclid's Elements.
• She wrote a text "The Astronomical Canon". (Either a new edition of Ptolemy's Handy Tables or commentary on the aforementioned Almagest.)

Her contributions to technology are reputed to include the invention of the hydrometer, used to determine the relative density (or specific gravity) of liquids. However, the hydrometer was invented before Hypatia, and already known in her time. Some say that this is a textual misinterpretation of the original Greek, which mentions a hydroscopium - a clock that works with water and gears, similar to the Antikythera mechanism.

Her student Synesius, bishop of Cyrene, wrote a letter describing his construction of an astrolabe. Earlier astrolabes predate that of Synesius by at least a century, and Hypatia's father had gained fame for his treatise on the subject. However, Synesius claimed that his was an improved model. Synesius also sent Hypatia a letter describing a hydrometer, and requesting her to have one constructed for him.

"Donning [the robe of a scholar], the lady made appearances around the center of the city, expounding in public to those willing to listen on Plato or Aristotle," the philosopher Damascius wrote after her death. Although contemporary fifth-century sources identify Hypatia of Alexandria as a practitioner and teacher of the philosophy of Plato and Plotinus, two hundred years later, the seventh-century Egyptian Coptic bishop John of Nikiû identified her as a Hellenistic pagan and that "she was devoted at all times to magic, astrolabes and instruments of music, and she beguiled many people through her Satanic wiles". However, not all Christians were as hostile towards her and some Christians even used Hypatia as symbolic of Virtue.

Source: Google search and Wikipedia.

Rosalind Franklin

#41/100 in #100extraordinarywomen

British chemist Rosalind Franklin is best known for her role in the discovery of the structure of DNA, and for her pioneering use of X-ray diffraction. She earned a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Cambridge University and learned crystallography and X-ray diffraction, techniques that she applied to DNA fibers. One of her photographs provided key insights into DNA structure. Other scientists used it as evidence to support their DNA model and took credit for the discovery. 

Rosalind Elsie Franklin was born to Ellis Arthur Franklin, a politically liberal London merchant banker, and Muriel Frances Waley into an affluent and influential Jewish family on July 25, 1920, in Notting Hill, London, England. Rosalind was the elder daughter and the second child in the family of five children. She displayed exceptional intelligence from early childhood, knowing from the age of 15 that she wanted to be a scientist. She received her education at several schools, including North London Collegiate School, where she excelled in science, among other things. Rosalind enrolled at Newnham College, Cambridge, in 1938 and studied chemistry. In 1941, she was awarded Second Class Honors in her finals, which, at that time, was accepted as a bachelor's degree in the qualifications for employment. She went on to work as an assistant research officer at the British Coal Utilisation Research Association, where she studied the porosity of coal—work that was the basis of her 1945 Ph.D. thesis "The physical chemistry of solid organic colloids with special reference to coal."

In the fall of 1946, Rosalind was appointed at the Laboratoire Central des Services Chimiques de l'Etat in Paris, where she worked with crystallographer Jacques Mering. He taught her X-ray diffraction, which would play an important role in her research that led to the discovery of "the secret of life"—the structure of DNA. In addition, she pioneered the use of X-rays to create images of crystalized solids in analyzing complex, unorganized matter, not just single crystals.

In January 1951, Rosalind began working as a research associate at the King's College London in the biophysics unit, where director John Randall used her expertise and X-ray diffraction techniques (mostly of proteins and lipids in solution) on DNA fibers. Studying DNA structure with X-ray diffraction, Rosalind and her student Raymond Gosling made an amazing discovery: They took pictures of DNA and discovered that there were two forms of it, a dry "A" form and a wet "B" form. One of their X-ray diffraction pictures of the "B" form of DNA, known as Photograph 51, became famous as critical evidence in identifying the structure of DNA. The photo was acquired through 100 hours of X-ray exposure from a machine Rosalind herself had refined.

John Desmond Bernal, one of the United Kingdom’s most well-known and controversial scientists and a pioneer in X-ray crystallography, spoke highly of Rosalind around the time of her death in 1958. "As a scientist Miss Franklin was distinguished by extreme clarity and perfection in everything she undertook," he said. "Her photographs were among the most beautiful X-ray photographs of any substance ever taken. Their excellence was the fruit of extreme care in preparation and mounting of the specimens as well as in the taking of the photographs."

Despite her cautious and diligent work ethic, Rosalind had a personality conflict with colleague Maurice Wilkins, one that would end up costing her greatly. In January 1953, Wilkins changed the course of DNA history by disclosing without Rosalind's permission or knowledge her Photo 51 to competing scientist James Watson, who was working on his own DNA model with Francis Crick at Cambridge. Upon seeing the photograph, Watson said, "My jaw fell open and my pulse began to race," according to author Brenda Maddox, who in 2002 wrote a book about Rosalind titled Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA.

The two scientists did in fact use what they saw in Photo 51 as the basis for their famous model of DNA, which they published on March 7, 1953, and for which they received a Nobel Prize in 1962. Crick and Watson were also able to take most of the credit for the finding: When publishing their model in Nature magazine in April 1953, they included a footnote acknowledging that they were "stimulated by a general knowledge" of Rosalind's and Wilkins' unpublished contribution, when in fact, much of their work was rooted in Rosalind's photo and findings. Randall and the Cambridge laboratory director came to an agreement, and both Wilkins' and Rosalind's articles were published second and third in the same issue of Nature. Still, it appeared that their articles were merely supporting Crick and Watson's.

According to Maddox, Rosalind didn't know that these men based their Nature article on her research, and she didn't complain either, likely as a result of her upbringing. Rosalind "didn't do anything that would invite criticism … [that was] bred into her," Maddox was quoted as saying in an October 2002 NPR interview. However, she is often also quoted as a victim as well as prime example of sexism in the field of science whereby she was never accorded proper credit for her vast body of work while her male colleagues got all the attention despite openly using her research.

Rosalind left King's College in March 1953 and relocated to Birkbeck College, where she studied the structure of the tobacco mosaic virus and the structure of RNA. Because Randall let Rosalind leave on the condition that she would not work on DNA, she turned her attention back to studies of coal. In five years, Rosalind published 17 papers on viruses, and her group laid the foundations for structural virology. She led pioneering work at Birkbeck on the molecular structures of viruses. Her team member Aaron Klug continued her research, winning the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1982.

As a person, Rosalind Franklin was best described as an agnostic. Her lack of religious faith apparently did not stem from anyone's influence, rather from her own inquisitive mind. She developed her scepticism as a young child. Her mother recalled that she refused to believe in the existence of god, and remarked, "Well, anyhow, how do you know He isn't She?" She however did not abandon Jewish traditions. As the only Jewish student at Lindores School, she had Hebrew lessons on her own while her friends went to church. She joined the Jewish Society while in her first term at Newnham College, Cambridge, out of respect of her grandfather's request. She confided to her sister that she was "always consciously a Jew". She loved travelling abroad, particularly trekking. She first ventured at Christmas 1929 for a vacation at Menton, France, where her grandfather went to escape English winter. A trip to France in 1938 gave her a lasting love for France and its language. She considered the French lifestyle as "vastly superior to that of English". In another instance, she trekked the French Alps with Jean Kerslake in 1946, which almost cost her her life when she slipped off on a slope, and was barely rescued. She made several professional trips to US, and was particularly jovial among her American friends and constantly displayed her sense of humour. William Ginoza of the University of California, Los Angeles later recalled that she was the opposite of Watson's description of her, and as Maddox comments, Americans enjoyed her "sunny side." She often expressed her political views. She initially blamed Winston Churchill for inciting the war, but later admired him for his speeches. She actively supported Professor John Ryle as an independent candidate for parliament in 1940, but he was unsuccessful. She did not seem to have intimate relationship with anyone and always kept her deepest personal feelings to herself. Since her younger days she avoided close friendship with the opposite sex.

In the fall of 1956, Rosalind discovered that she had ovarian cancer. She continued working throughout the following two years, despite having three operations and experimental chemotherapy. She experienced a 10-month remission and worked up until several weeks before her death on April 16, 1958, at the age of 37. She died four years before the Nobel prize was awarded to Watson, Crick and Wilkins for their work on DNA structure. She never learned the full extent to which Watson and Crick had relied on her data to make their model; if she suspected, she did not express any bitterness or frustration, and in subsequent years she became very friendly with Crick and his wife, Odile. It is clear that, had Franklin lived, the Nobel prize committee ought to have awarded her a Nobel prize, too – her conceptual understanding of the structure of the DNA molecule and its significance was on a par with that of Watson and Crick, while her crystallographic data were as good as, if not better, than those of Wilkins. The simple expedient would have been to award Watson and Crick the prize for Physiology or Medicine, while Franklin and Watkins received the prize for Chemistry. However, the Nobel Committee does not make posthumous nominations and hence Rosalind Franklin’s name was totally ignored at the time of granting the award. 

Source: Google search and Wikipedia.

Shereen Ratnagar

#40/100 in #100extraordinarywomen

Back in the days when archaeology was a developing discipline, it was – like so many things – dominated by men. Or so you would think if you only looked at Wikipedia’s archaeology page. In fact, some of the discipline’s most significant early developments were forged by women. Jane Dieulafoy, Gertrude Bell, Harriet Boyd Hawes, Kathleen Kenyon, Tatiana Proskouriakoff and Jacquetta Hawkes are just a handful of some of the boldest women from the early days of archaeology who were determined to push things forward in new and important ways. In the modern times, one such name that stands out in this excessively male dominated field is that of Shereen Ratnagar.

In the early days of nation building the past was used as a nation-building force. Many notions of Indian civilization had already been projected by the colonial administration and the early Indologists. The Harappan past was then seen through this lens. But how “Indian” was the Indus Valley Civilization, was a question often asked. Could it have been organized on the lines of caste, and could it have been an age without war, as has often been suggested? Shereen Ratnagar, a noted scholar investigating aspects of the Indus Civilization, has tried to answer these very pressing questions through her works. 

Shereen was educated at Deccan College, Pune, University of Pune. She studied Mesopotamian archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London. She was a professor of archaeology and ancient history at the Centre for Historical Studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi. Shereen gave up her Professorship in Archaeology when “it ceased to be fun” and has since been researching and teaching in various places. Her interests include the bronze age, trade, urbanism, pastoralism, and, recently, the social dimensions of early technology. She writes extensively and authoritatively on archaeological matters. Her books are widely read by students, teachers and scholars, of course, but also by the general reader. Her style of writing is friendly and accessible, which makes reading her a pleasure. She retired in 2000, and is currently an independent researcher living in Mumbai. She is noted for work on investigating the factors contributing to the end of the Indus Valley Civilization. She is the author of several texts and her books include ‘Understanding Harappa’ (Tulika, 2006), ‘The End of the Great Harappan Tradition’ (Manohar, 2002), ‘Trading Encounters from the Euphrates to the Indus in the Bronze Age’ (Delhi: Oxford 2004), ‘The Other Indians’ (Delhi: Three Essays 2006) and ‘Makers and Shapers: Early Indian Technology in the Household, Village and Urban Workshop’ (Delhi: Tulika 2007). 

Usually keeping a low profile and fiercely guarding her private life, Shereen came into limelight thanks to the Ayodhya controversy. Shereen along with archaeologist D. Mandal had spent a day, in 2003, examining the excavations conducted by the Archaeological Society of India (ASI) at the site of the Babri Masjid on behalf of the Sunni Waqf Board. Subsequently, the two researchers wrote a highly critical appraisal of the excavations by the ASI titled ‘Ayodhya: Archaeology after Excavation’. In 2010, they appeared as expert witnesses for the Sunni Waqf Board in the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid case in the Allahabad High Court. In its judgement on the Ayodhya dispute, the High Court flayed the role played by several witnesses including her, who was forced to admit under oath that she had no field experience in archeological excavations in India. Shereen and her supporters defend her record by stating that she has participated in some archaeological digs at sites outside India, such as Tell al-Rimah, Iraq, in 1971, as well as in Turkey and the Gulf. Earlier in the case, Shereen was also served a contempt notice for violating a court order restraining witnesses in the ongoing case from airing their views in public.

Once again, she recently came into the limelight when Ashutosh Gowarikar’s movie, ‘Mohenjo Daro’, was released and was shrouded in controversy regarding historically inaccurate and politically controversial flashing of horses and the use of heavily Sanskritised dialogues in the film. When the film revived the age-old debate around the Harappan civilization, many journalists reached out to Shereen to gather her views on the controversial issues surrounding the civilisation.

However, controversies or no controversies, it cannot be denied that Shereen is by far an authority on the Harappan civilization and her immense contribution to its study cannot be underestimated. 

Source: Wikipedia and Google search.