Sharman Apt Russell lives in southwestern New Mexico, USA and taught writing at Western New Mexico University and Antioch University in Los Angeles. Her books include Standing in the Light: My Life as a Pantheist (Basic Books, 2008); Hunger: An Unnatural History (Basic Books, 2005); An Obsession with Butterflies (Perseus Books, 2003); and Anatomy of a Rose: The Secret Life of Flowers (Perseus Books, 2001). Her work has been widely anthologized and translated into nine languages. Her awards include a Rockefeller Fellowship and a Pushcart Prize.
Diary of a Citizen Scientist is full of wit and wisdom and forays
into neuroscience and psychology. Even better, the book also offers
a portrait of the phenomenon of Citizen Science. Citizen scientists
are devoted amateurs. They spend large chunks of their lives
cataloguing galaxies, tracking tree frogs, or identifying fossils
from long-dry seas. They range from enthusiastic retirees to
schoolchildren to just about every type of person you can think of.
Pygmies in the Congo use specially formatted smartphones (images
instead of words) to record data about deforestation and illegal
poaching. Every year, of the 19,000 species newly described,
citizen scientists are responsible for 60% of the descriptions. The
information about Citizen Science gives the book heft, the sense of
the author joining a movement larger than herself, that will be
here and growing long after she's trapped her last tiger beetle.
Several times she quotes a line by a scientist who inspires her:
"You could spend a week studying some obscure insect and you would
know more than anyone else on the planet." The line goes some way
to explaining what drives her. --JJ Amaworo Wilson, Mailbox
Chronicle Reviews
Russell has always been a thoughtful writer, able to examine issues
as diverse as ranching (Kill the Cowboy) and hunger (Hunger: An
Unnatural History) with balance and clarity. With Diary of a
Citizen Scientist, her most personal book yet, Russell ranges from
thoughtful examination to luminous revelation that reads like
William Wordsworth or Annie Dillard, the soul shivering with
ecstasy... Diary of a Citizen Scientist is a journey narrative, a
chronicle of a search that changes the author along the way.
Russell is a 57-year-old writer and teacher of creative writing at
the college level when she decides to combat her growing sense of
helplessness about the state of the world today by doing something
useful. She picks tiger beetles because they are found near her
Gila River Valley home, and because while they are widespread
across the earth, the basics of their lives remains unknown (like
where the burrows their larvae live in are located, and how long it
takes the earth-bound larvae to go from egg to winged adult). Along
the way, Russell learns the thrill and tedium of field science, the
excitement when something happens; the long hours when the search
yields a big fat zero; and the challenges of dissecting tiny
beetles, which she realizes are no greater than those of
translating her fascination with tiger beetles into the minds of
the third-graders who Russell's daughter teaches. Russell learns to
speak entomology jargon of setae (bristles) and metanotums (body
parts), and comes to understand the point of the quotidian, the
mundane work of counting and collecting, taking notes and tallying
data. Most importantly though, Russell learns the power of seeing
and understanding the earth at a deeper level, participating in a
search for answers that is the ultimate antidote to despair. Diary
of a Citizen Scientist is both a journey that transforms Russell
and her understanding of herself and the planet she loves, and a
clarion call to join a movement. --Susan J. Tweit, Storybook Circle
Reviews
Named as one of the top ten best nature books of 2014 by
GrrlScientist in The Guardian.
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