Marcia Ascher
{{short description|American ethnomathematician}}
File:Tinne Hoff Kjeldsen and Marcia Ascher, Oberwolfach Photo Collection.jpg
Marcia Alper Ascher (April 23, 1935 – August 10, 2013) was an American mathematician, and a leader and pioneer in ethnomathematics.{{r|pass}} She was a professor emerita of mathematics at Ithaca College.{{r|enc|obit}}
Life
Ascher was born in New York City, the daughter of a glazier and a secretary. She graduated from Queens College, City University of New York in 1956,{{r|enc}} and married Robert Ascher, an anthropologist graduating from Queens College in the same year.{{r|enc|robert}}
They both became graduate students at the University of California, Los Angeles;{{r|robert}} she completed a master's degree in 1960,{{r|enc}} and moved with her husband to Ithaca, New York, where he had found a faculty position at Cornell University.{{r|robert}}
She joined the mathematics department at Ithaca College in 1960, as one of the founders of the department.{{r|pass|obit}} She retired as full professor emerita in 1995.{{r|pass|enc}}
She died on August 10, 2013.{{r|maa|obit}}
Books
With her husband, Ascher co-authored the book Code of the Quipu: A Study in Media, Mathematics, and Culture (University of Michigan Press, 1981); it was republished in 1997 by Dover Books as Mathematics of the Incas: Code of the Quipu.{{r|code}} She was also the sole author of two more books on ethnomathematics, Ethnomathematics: A Multicultural View of Mathematical Ideas (Brooks/Cole, 1991){{r|ethno}} and Mathematics Elsewhere: An Exploration of Ideas across Cultures (Princeton University Press, 2002).{{r|elsewhere}} The Basic Library List Committee of the Mathematical Association of America has recommended the inclusion of all three books in undergraduate mathematics libraries.{{r|bll}} Mathematics Elsewhere won an honorable mention in the 2002 PROSE Awards in the mathematics and statistics category.{{r|prose}}
References
{{reflist|refs=
{{citation|title=Code of the Quipu: A Study in Media, Mathematics, and Culture|publisher=Mathematical Association of America|accessdate=2020-03-05|url=https://www.maa.org/press/maa-reviews/code-of-the-quipu-a-study-in-media-mathematics-and-culture}}; see also {{harvtxt|Ashbacher|2003}} and {{harvtxt|Gouvêa|2009}}
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- {{citation|last=Thompson|first=Donald E.|date=November–December 1981|issue=6|journal=Archaeology|jstor=41728213|page=72|title=none|volume=34}}
- {{citation|last=Urton|first=Gary|author-link=Gary Urton|date=May 21, 1982|issue=4548|journal=Science|series=New Series|jstor=1687534|pages=869–870|title=Inca encodements|volume=216|doi=10.1126/science.216.4548.869|pmid=17819163}}
- {{citation|last=Restivo|first=Sal|author-link=Sal Restivo|date=June 1982|doi=10.1086/352998|issue=2|journal=Isis|jstor=231703|pages=296–297|title=none|volume=73}}
- {{citation|last=LeBlanc|first=Catherine J.|date=October 1982|doi=10.2307/280304|issue=4|journal=American Antiquity|jstor=280304|page=915|title=none|volume=47}}
- {{citation|last=Closs|first=M. P.|journal=Mathematical Reviews|mr=0646063|title=none|year=1983}}
- {{citation|last=Niles|first=Susan A.|date=November 1983|doi=10.1525/ae.1983.10.4.02a00330|issue=4|journal=American Ethnologist|jstor=644085|pages=814–815|title=none|volume=10|doi-access=free}}
- {{citation|last=Tropp|first=Henry S.|date=July 1998|doi=10.2307/3620440|issue=494|journal=The Mathematical Gazette|jstor=3620440|pages=329–330|title=none|volume=82}}
- {{citation|last=Morrison|first=Philip|author-link=Philip Morrison|date=August 1991|issue=2|journal=Scientific American|jstor=24938694|pages=108–110|title=Logic and strategy|volume=265}}
- {{citation|last=Høyrup|first=Jens|author-link=Jens Høyrup|journal=Mathematical Reviews|mr=1095781|title=none|year=1992}}
- {{citation|last1=Kidd|first1=Dawn H.|last2=Lamb|first2=Charles E.|date=January 1992|issue=1|journal=The Mathematics Teacher|jstor=27967460|page=73|title=none|volume=85}}
- {{citation|last=Wilde|first=Carroll|date=March–April 1992|issue=2|journal=American Scientist|jstor=29774627|page=200|title=none|volume=80}}
- {{citation|last=Swetz|first=Frank|date=September 1992|doi=10.2307/2686959|issue=4|journal=The College Mathematics Journal|jstor=2686959|pages=353–355|title=none|volume=23}}
- {{citation|last=Grabiner|first=Judith V.|author-link=Judith Grabiner|date=March 1993|doi=10.2307/2324476|issue=3|journal=American Mathematical Monthly|jstor=2324476|pages=304–308|title=none|volume=100}}
- {{citation|last=Hersh|first=Reuben|author-link=Reuben Hersh|date=March 1993|doi=10.1137/1035025|issue=1|journal=SIAM Review|jstor=2132540|pages=151–153|title=none|volume=35}}
- {{citation|last=Crump|first=Thomas|date=November 1994|doi=10.1525/ae.1994.21.4.02a00380|issue=4|journal=American Ethnologist|jstor=646871|pages=922–923|title=none|volume=21}}
- {{citation|last=Berken|first=Bernadette Anne|journal=Humanistic Mathematics Network Journal|at=Article 13|title=Review|url=https://scholarship.claremont.edu/hmnj/vol1/iss14/13|volume=14|year=1996}}
- {{citation|last=Gouvêa|first=Fernando Q.|author-link=Fernando Q. Gouvêa|date=July 2009|journal=MAA Reviews|publisher=Mathematical Association of America|title=Review|url=https://www.maa.org/press/maa-reviews/ethnomathematics-a-multicultural-view-of-mathematical-ideas}}
Reviews of Mathematics Elsewhere:
- {{citation|last=Ninnemann|first=Olaf|journal=zbMATH|title=none|zbl=1115.01003}}
- {{citation|last=O'Connor|first=John|date=October 2002|doi=10.1038/419563a|issue=6907|journal=Nature|pages=563|title=Mathematics off the main line|volume=419|bibcode=2002Natur.419..563O|s2cid=38250388|doi-access=free}}
- {{citation|last=Selin|first=Helaine|author-link=Helaine Selin|date=November 1, 2002|issue=5595|journal=Science|jstor=3832880|pages=969–970|series=New Series|title=An inclusive perspective|volume=298|doi=10.1126/science.1077975|s2cid=178391682}}
- {{citation|last=Gilsdorf|first=Thomas E.|journal=Mathematical Reviews|mr=1918532|title=none|year=2003}}
- {{citation|last=Ashbacher|first=Charlie|date=January 2003|journal=MAA Reviews|publisher=Mathematical Association of America|title=Review|url=https://www.maa.org/press/maa-reviews/mathematics-elsewhere-an-exploration-of-ideas-across-cultures}}
- {{citation|last=Davis|first=Philip J.|author-link=Philip J. Davis|date=March 2003|issue=2|journal=SIAM News|title=Is mathematics a unified whole?|url=https://archive.siam.org/pdf/news/301.pdf|volume=36}}
- {{citation|last=Caniglia|first=Joanne|date=May 2003|issue=9|journal=Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School|jstor=41181368|page=504|title=none|volume=8}}
- {{citation|last=Katz|first=Victor J.|author-link=Victor J. Katz|date=May 2003|issue=5|journal=Notices of the American Mathematical Society|pages=556–560|title=Review|url=https://www.ams.org/notices/200305/rev-katz.pdf|volume=50}}
- {{citation|last=Crowe|first=Donald|date=September 2003|issue=3|journal=SIAM Review|jstor=25054440|pages=601–602|title=none|volume=45}}
- {{citation|last=Schrock|first=Connie S.|date=November 2003|issue=8|journal=The Mathematics Teacher|jstor=20871446|page=605|title=none|volume=96}}
- {{citation|last=Leversha|first=Gerry|date=November 2003|doi=10.1017/S0025557200174091|issue=510|journal=The Mathematical Gazette|jstor=3621326|pages=600–602|title=none|volume=87}}
- {{citation|last=Zeitlyn|first=David|date=September 2004|issue=3|journal=Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute|jstor=3803813|page=717|title=none|volume=10}}
- {{citation|last=Cohen|first=Marion D.|author-link=Marion Cohen|date=October 2004|doi=10.2307/4145063|issue=8|journal=American Mathematical Monthly|jstor=4145063|pages=735–738|title=none|volume=111}}
- {{citation|last=Seife|first=Charles|author-link=Charles Seife|date=Winter 2003|issue=1|journal=The Wilson Quarterly|jstor=40260723|pages=124–125|title=none|volume=27}}
- {{citation|last=Gosztonyi|first=Balázs|date=January 2006|issue=2|journal=Mathematical Spectrum|pages=94–95|title=Review|url=https://www.appliedprobability.org/data/files/MS%20issues/Vol38_No2.pdf|volume=38}}
{{citation|url=https://www.maa.org/news/memoriam|title=In memoriam|publisher=Mathematical Association of America|accessdate=2020-03-05}}
{{citation|title=2002 Award Winners|work=PROSE Awards|publisher=Association of American Publishers|url=https://proseawards.com/winners/2002-award-winners/}}
}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ascher, Marcia}}
Category:20th-century American mathematicians
Category:21st-century American mathematicians
Category:21st-century American women mathematicians
Category:Queens College, City University of New York alumni
Category:Ithaca College faculty