ShmoopTube

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[Dino and Coop singing]

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Go ahead and picture the most typical math nerd imaginable.

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Maybe you're envisioning a scrawny, four-eyed dweeb straight out of some '80s movie. [Guy thinking of a nerd in a library]

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Or maybe you went to the more historic route, imagining a famous mathematician like Fibonacci

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or Isaac Newton or Albert Einstein. [Pictures of the famous people]

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But whether you pictured a Hollywood geek or a historical nerd, it's safe to say that

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you probably pictured... a man.

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But that's not because there haven’t been a ton of super talented and geeky female math

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nerds throughout history – it's just that we don't often hear about them. [Pictures of female 'nerds']

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Until now… Meet Hypatia, a mathematician,

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astronomer, philosopher and teacher who was born in Alexandria, Egypt in the year 350, [Coop and Dino pointing at a blackboard]

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which was… a really long time ago.

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Meaning that things were awfully different back then. Like…people didn't feel it was [Men only sign]

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all important to educate women. [Angry women walking away]

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Luckily Hypatia, had a cool dad who went against the grain and thought that women [Guy wearing 'Worlds Coolest Dad' cap]

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should learn just like men.

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This cool dad's name was Theon. He was a professor of math at the University of Alexandria, and

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a great thinker in his own right. And, of course, he taught Hypatia everything he knew. [Coop pointing at a blackboard]

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His daughter’s mind developed quickly. Spending a lot of time outdoors, she developed a passion [Hypatia looking down a telescope]

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for astronomy…

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… and debates with her father about the meaning of life…

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… led her to become an avid philosopher, too.

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In other words, their Father-Daughter bonding time was less “ice cream and a trip to the [Hypatia and her father on the beach]

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beach” and more “arguing about really complicated stuff all the time.”

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But hey, it worked for them.

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Not only was Hypatia an astronomer, mathematician, philosopher and teacher, but she was an inventor

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on top of everything else.

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She invented the astrolabe, an elaborate instrument used to study the sky. [Diagram of an astrolabe]

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Just take one look at it and you know she was smart, because that thing looks confusing. [Picture of an astrolabe]

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Hypatia was a memorable teacher, too, influencing many students who went on to become great thinkers. [Hypatia teaching a class]

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So there you have it – women can be giant nerds, too! Equality for all nerd-dom! [Girls wearing nerdy glasses in a science lab]

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