Short biography of a famous computer scientist
In the mid-20th century, when societies were largely male-dominated, nearly all students enrolled in computer science programs were men. Women were often discouraged from going to universities and studying programs like programming, math, or physics. But despite all the challenges Barbara Liskov managed to become one of the first women in the United States who was awarded a PH.D. from the Computer science department and who won the A.M. Turing Award, the highest honor in computer science (Stanford News 2009).
Liskov was born in Los Angeles, California, on November 7, 1939, to a Jewish family. She earned her BA in mathematics with a minor in physics at the University of California, Berkeley in 1961 (Vleck T. 2008).
Liskov's mathematical background inspired her to approach programming as a mathematical issue - a problem that could be informed and guided by logical principles and aesthetic beauty (D’Agostino S. 2019).
By focusing on data rather than process, she demonstrated how software could be made easier to construct. Liskov invented CLU, an object-oriented programming language, Argus, a distributed programming language and managed to make computer programs more reliable, secure, and easy to use (Aspray W.1991).
Liskov’s innovations are incorporated into nearly all modern programming languages (Aspray W.1991). Almost every major programming language used today, including Java, C++, and C#, is considered to be descendants of CLU.
Barbara Liskov is widely recognized as one of the most important women in computer science. She is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Sciences (MIT 2021). Liskov received the IEEE Von Neumann medal in 2004, the IEEE Pioneer Award in 2018 (MIT 2021), a lifetime achievement award from the Society of Women Engineers in 1996, and Discover Magazine named her as one of the 50 most important women in science (Svitil. K.A. 2002).
