WEEK 9

Artist interview: JoAnne Growney

By Sarah Glaz

Summary

This article is all about JoAnne Growney's Life, which integrates both math and poetry. The content is an interview conducted by Sarah Glaz in 2017 during the Bridges conference in Canada. JoAnne shares her experiences and insights into her journey through math and poetry. She shares about her childhood days, her inspiration to start writing poems, math, poetry and her blog. She writes poems based on her real-life experiences, environmental issues, scarcity of women in mathematics, and abortion, and connects them with math. She says that math and poetry are the best blend. JoAnne was part of the pioneering group of mathematicians who not only wrote poetry with strong links to mathematics but also enthusiastically supported the cause of making mathematical poetry a visible and respected part of the collective creative work of both poets and mathematicians. The interview and the ten poems authored by JoAnne presented in this article reflect on the various influences and events in JoAnne’s journey through a life that includes both mathematics and poetry.

JoAnne Growney

JoAnne Growney reads "Love Mathematics!" and "A Baker's Dozen"

Stop 1

This poem really made me stop and think about the issue of the scarcity of women in the STEM field. It is a long-standing issue. Even if we say that everything is in progress there is a small number of women representing these fields. The main reasons are educational biases, lack of role models, unconscious biases, unwelcoming workplace cultures, and family expectations. I hope there will be a change in the upcoming days. Jo Anne presents this issue connecting with math in a beautiful way of 5 🇽 5 syllable square poem.

Stop 2

Can a mathematician See Red?

Consider the sphere—

a hollow rounded surface

whose outside points

are the very same points

insiders see.

If red paint spills

all over the outside,

is the inside red?

The mathematician says, No,

the layer of paint

forms a new sphere

that is outside the outside

and not a bit inside.

A mathematician

sees the world

as she defines it.

A poet

sees red

inside.

This poem explains the perspectives of a mathematician and a poet on a seemingly simple object – a sphere. I think it is a true fact because everyone defines objectives by their own perception or profession. When I was working as a math teacher, we faced different situations. Sometimes, math teacher thinks about logic and reasoning and they try to find the solution. Language teacher sees it emotionally and artistically. By the end of the day, as JoAnne says everything connects and math and art are a perfect blend.

Question

"How can combining math and writing poems in school help us understand things better?"

Reference

Glaz, S. (2019). Artist interview: JoAnne Growney. Journal of Mathematics and the Arts, 13(3), 243–260. https://doi.org/10.1080/17513472.2018.1532869