Evolutionary Theory
Women’s letters reveal altruism as driver of evolution
T
ina Gianquitto teaches courses in American literature at Mines, but her current research focuses on works that have never been published. An associate professor in the Liberal Arts and International Studies Division, Gianquitto is intrigued by late 19th century women reformers and their correspondence with naturalist Charles Darwin. The reforms those American women championed included suffrage, animal protection, labor law reform and poverty reforms. Many of the women who wrote to Darwin in England supplied him with information he incorporated into his later books, written after his seminal work about evolution in 1859, On the Origin of Species. Others wrote to challenge Darwin’s ideas, especially his representation of women’s intellectual abilities. Gianquitto explained part of her research involves examining the notion of nature in a post-evolutionary landscape. “After Darwin, people began to understand the natural world as a web of relationships, where action in one realm produced reactions in others. Species co-evolved; communities of individual organisms co-adapted for mutual benefit. This understanding of nature as a web of complex interaction provided a new language for those looking to re-imagine human communities,” Gianquitto said. In part, the theory of evolution freed women from their prior roles in society and offered support for those fighting for the rights of the poor and oppressed. She said her focus on Darwin is different from the “social Darwinism” or the survival of the strongest over society’s weaker members. Instead, Gianquitto is interested in displaying a lesser-known narrative of evolution. “This narrative, supported by many of the women I study, focused on altruism, on the ‘moral sense’ developed for the good of 20
Colorado School of Mines
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Dear Mr.Darwin Professor Tina Gianquitto kayaking in the Harriman Fjord in Alaska.
the community as a whole, as a key driver of evolution,” she said. The focus on women is important to the cultural understanding of evolution, and Gianquitto sees it as having a broad impact on several communities. It will benefit the community of scholars who study the history of science, women’s studies and the history of Darwinism, but she hopes to reach a broader general audience. “Darwin and the impact of evolutionary theory remains a compelling topic for many. This story — of women’s response to and use of evolutionary theory — is one that has not been told.” Gianquitto works with a number of archives and communicates regularly with other literary scholars. Her research has taken her to Cambridge, London and Manchester, England; the Huntington Library in San Marino, Calif., and to Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Last summer, she was in England reading through boxes of handwritten correspondence to and from Darwin. Her research is supported by fellowships including the National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship; the American Council of Learned Societies Charles A. Ryskamp Fellowship; and the Dibner History of Science Fellowship from the Huntington Library. She has published several articles and a book, Good Observers of Nature: American Women and the Scientific Study of the Natural World, 1820-1885 (University of Georgia Press, 2007). Her book in progress is tentatively titled Dear Mr. Darwin: Women, Evolution, and Radical Social Reform. Energy
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