Doctoral Dissertation Research: An Integrative Biography of Barbara McClintock and Transposable Elements

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This project will construct an integrative biography of Nobel laureate Barbara McClintock to help teachers of the history of science communicate McClintock's work to students, and to help clarify the role of gender in the practice of science and the development of scientific knowledge. Rather than be seen within the context of a gendered model of scientific thought which unfairly robs her of agency, McClintock will be seen as a transition figure in the shift from turn of the century natural history to modern molecular genetics. Moreover, the project seeks to examine many new sources that have become available. These include McClintocks' laboratory notebooks and the 3 by 5 cards on which she recorded her genetic crosses; her experimental material, correspondence, and a festschrift produced for her 90th birthday in 1992. Interviews with her colleagues and friends, supplemented by the festschrift will frame a composite sketch of the reception of transposons and a portrait of McClintock as a woman and scientist.