Why Am I Afraid of Math?
Despite parents of the you-can-be-anything-you-want persuasion, Emily Heist-Moss absorbed the misguided notion that math and science were not going to play a role in her future. Why?
I’ve spent the last fifteen years studiously avoiding math and science. Now I’m 23 and I’m just starting to wonder why.
Other subjects, namely the ones involving words, came naturally to me, or so I thought. Every time I had the opportunity to sink my teeth into math or science as I would a classic novel or epoch of history, I shied away. I became very good at dodging math bullets. In retrospect, the pattern is near pathological, and I’ve been trying to piece together when and where this aversion started. How much of it is just how I’m wired, and how much of it comes from media exposure that promotes the message that math is hard for girls?
I was a child in love with books. Somewhere along the line, I’d estimate 7th grade, the fact that I was good at reading and writing began to eclipse any other talents I might have developed. Advanced English and social studies classes absorbed all the energy I had for academic pursuits, and math and science were relegated to the minimum I could get away with and still…
