Date
7-22-2025
Department
College of Arts and Sciences
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy in History (PhD)
Chair
Mary Mac Ogden
Keywords
Orientalism, Chien-Shiung Wu, Scientific History, Women's History, Transnationalism, Manhattan Project, immigration, intersectionality, Asian American History, women of science, physics, physicists, women in physics, the gaze, double consciousness, beta decay, Edward Said, Chinese American scientists, Orientalist historiography, Race and gender in science, Scientific erasure, Historical marginalization, Epistemic exclusion, Feminist historiography, Postcolonial studies, Decolonizing science, Cultural analysis of science, Columbia University archives, UC Berkeley history, Asian American history, Cold War science, 20th-century physics, Transnational scientists, Immigrant women in STEM, "Chien-Shiung Wu and Orientalism", "Women of color in American science", "Asian American scientists in Cold War America", "Gendered narratives in the history of science", "Scientific recognition and historical erasure", "Edward Said Orientalism applied to science", "Intersectional analysis of scientific historiography"
Disciplines
History
Recommended Citation
Ramsey, RaeAnn L., "Orientalism: In the American Life of Chien-Shiung Wu" (2025). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 7248.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/7248
Abstract
Edward Said's Orientalism argues that the Western paradigm historically Others the East, viewing the “Orient” as exotic and inferior, an epistemological narrative that reinforces Western primacy. Imposing reductive stereotypes on Eastern cultures and individuals generates inaccurate and inauthentic histories. Building on Edward Said’s foundational critique in Orientalism, this work also engages with scholarship in women’s and gender history to further analyze how intersecting narratives of race, gender, and nation have shaped the recording—and erasure—of Chien-Shiung Wu’s accomplishments.
As analyzed in this work, Chien-Shiung Wu’s experiences in the United States and in the American scientific community were influenced by these biases. Although Wu was a key figure in many major scientific breakthroughs, she was often overlooked for jobs and major awards and honors, which were instead given to her male, Western colleagues. This dissertation explores how Wu’s identity, as a Chinese woman in the United States, was often understood within the Orientalist paradigm. This view emphasizes her lack of belonging or Otherness, thus devaluing her identity as a prominent figure in the American scientific community and sometimes marginalizing her contributions to the field of physics. The Orientalist framework not only diminishes her legacy but also perpetuates an errant view of Asian Americans as perpetual outsiders in the narrative of American progress.
Wu’s scientific career and personal life form the foundation of this study, providing both the evidence and the inspiration for interrogating broader patterns of historical invisibility. By analyzing Wu’s key scientific work, including her pioneering experiments on beta decay and her critical role in the Manhattan Project, this study underscores the magnitude of her overlooked contributions. By evaluating the milieu of cultural Orientalism in Wu’s American life—specifically how she was viewed, talked about, described, treated, and represented—this dissertation identifies the broader implications of Orientalist historiography as a mechanism that obfuscates scholarship. This study adopts a historical methodology grounded in cultural analysis, scientific historiography, and an intersectional approach that centers race, gender, and nation. This work draws on a range of primary and secondary sources, including archival materials housed at Columbia University, where Wu worked and taught, and the University of California, Berkeley, where Wu earned her doctorate. In doing so, it contributes to an emerging body of scholarship that seeks to decolonize and democratize the history of science by centering historically marginalized voices.
Ultimately, this dissertation argues that Wu remained largely invisible in the historical record because her story was filtered through intersecting frameworks of Orientalism, sexism, and other biased lenses upheld by her colleagues, peers, the media, and American society at large. It calls for a reassessment of how history documents and celebrates scientists and scientific achievements, advocating for a more inclusive and accurate historiography that fully recognizes the diverse range of individuals who have shaped scientific progress.
