#AcademicRunPlaylist - 2/8/25

It was a nice winter day, and while waiting for my youngest to finish skiing I was able to go on a good walk through the woods and listen to a book for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

Today I listened to "The Hello Girls: America's First Women Soldiers" by Elizabeth Cobbs. This book is a fascinating examination of a wide variety of topics - the evolution of the workplace, sexism, women's suffrage, multilingual workplaces, the socio-technical system of telephony, and WWI history. At its center are the "Hello Girls," the telephone operators conscripted to ensure effective communication within the American military and with allied nations. Due to the gendered nature of the telephone operator industry at the time and its position at the bleeding edge of technological development, bringing women into the military fold was vital despite it clashing with longstanding gender norms. This reverberated through the military organization, spreading into the fight for women's suffrage in the US and eventually the extremely belated recognition of the contribution of these pioneers. Highly recommend https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674237438