A life observed
Maria Sibylla Merian
Publishes Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium, bringing insects and their habitats onto the same page.
Source: British MuseumHerCV — The Course of a LifeStudy / Work / Discovery / Afterlife
Every life has
a curriculum.
Not just what she did.
How a life unfolded.
Women’s lives in science, exploration, craft and invention. Read through the records they left behind.
Read the lives
Five chapters. Countless ways to live them.An invitation to look closer ↘
The thread through the record
The course
of a life.
A curriculum vitae is a “course of life”. Here, its familiar headings become a way into biography: what was learned, what was made, what changed, and what endured.
01
Study
Learning is not always a school. A workshop, a family, or a night sky can be a beginning.
02
First post
A place to practise. Sometimes paid, sometimes informal; often difficult to enter.
03
Firsts
A result that changes the record. Always ask: first where, for whom, and by what measure?
04
Honours
Recognition has its own timetable. It can arrive late, be shared, or never come at all.
05
Legacy
The work moves into other hands. Lives continue through what others do with them.
A reading path, not a rule: no life moves in a perfectly straight line.
Ways into the collection
Seven fields.
No small lives.
From a sheet of pressed plants to a new measure of the stars. Follow the work across the boundaries.
Reading between the headings
Anatomy
of a CV.
The neatness of a record can hide the texture of a life. Read each line as an opening, not a conclusion.
The margins matter, too. ↘Curriculum vitae
A life, in the record
A biographer’s reading sheetEducation
Schools, teachers, apprenticeships, self-directed study.
Who had access to learning?Appointments
Laboratories, journeys, workshops, and unpaid work.
A title does not tell the whole story.Firsts
A publication, a discovery, a threshold crossed.
Keep the claim as narrow as the evidence.Honours
Awards, memberships, citations, and their absences.
Recognition is not the same as impact.Legacy
Objects, methods, students, and later interpretations.
Who carried the work forward?A metaphor for historical reading — not a template for a job application.
Dates that open a story
The firsts
ledger.
Some entries mark a first; others mark a publication or recognition. Every date is a doorway into a longer account.
On the meaning of “first”More than calculation
Ada Lovelace
Her translation and extensive Notes on the Analytical Engine appear in Scientific Memoirs.
Source: Science MuseumAn institution opens
Elizabeth Blackwell
Receives an MD from Geneva Medical College: the first woman to earn the degree from an American medical school.
Source: Harvard Medical SchoolRecognition, shared
Marie Curie
Shares the Nobel Prize in Physics with Pierre Curie and Henri Becquerel. A milestone, not a solitary achievement.
Source: Nobel PrizeA measure of distance
Henrietta Swan Leavitt
Her work on 25 variable stars establishes the Cepheid period–luminosity relationship more firmly, following her 1908 observations.
Source: NASAAcross an ocean, alone
Amelia Earhart
Becomes the first woman to fly nonstop and solo across the Atlantic, on 20–21 May.
Source: National Air and Space MuseumBeyond the atmosphere
Valentina Tereshkova
Becomes the first woman in space aboard Vostok 6, launched on 16 June.
Source: NASAFour habits of attention
How to read
a life.
A little care with the record makes room for a more interesting story.
01
Start with a source
A letter, a notebook, a register. Ask who made the record, and what it was made to do.
02
Put dates in order
Separate the day of an event from the date it was published, remembered, or recognised.
03
Restore the surroundings
Look for collaborators, material conditions, institutions, and the people the record leaves unnamed.
04
Follow what remains
An instrument, an idea, a practice. A legacy is something later lives continue to interpret.
Before you turn the page
A few
questions.
What does HerCV mean?
Her curriculum vitae: the course of a life. We use the idea of a record to explore women’s lives and work.
Is every entry a world first?
No. Publications, discoveries, appointments and recognition belong in the record too. Where we say “first”, we specify its scope and link to a source.
Are the pictures historical documents?
No. The homepage’s object studies are original generated illustrations of imagined scenes. They do not document any named person’s possessions or workplace.
Can I suggest a correction?
Yes. Send the page address, the wording in question, and a reliable source through Contact. Please do not send private personal records.