Images of Another Physical World

• In Event: Roundtable Session 19
  In Roundtable Session: Literacy Inequities: Analysis of Diversity Discourse

Abstract

As a female physics and astronomy instructor, I only very rarely find in physics textbooks images that illustrate my worldview. I present what a physics textbook could look like, if the illustrations were inspired by embodied knowledge, feminine symbolism, and the assumption that nature is the supreme engineer. We carefully researched examples in the everyday life experience of women and Indigenous people, and in the natural world, of phenomena that can illustrate basic physics principles, without relying on images of machinery, weaponry or consumption goods. Our aim is to celebrate nature and all life forms, rather than glorifying the achievements of a mechanist and reductionist domination of nature.

Authors

• Ben Jeanne Pfeiffer, Langara College

• Bradley Hughes, Langara College