Sandra Blakeslee
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Sandra Blakeslee (born 1943) is an American science correspondent of over four decades for ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' and
science writer Science journalism conveys reporting about science to the public. The field typically involves interactions between scientists, journalists, and the public. Origins Modern science journalism dates back to ''Digdarshan'' (means showing the di ...
, specializing in
neuroscience Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions and disorders. It is a multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, development ...
. Together with neuroscientist
V. S. Ramachandran Vilayanur Subramanian Ramachandran (born 10 August 1951) is an Indian-American neuroscientist. He is known for his wide-ranging experiments and theories in behavioral neurology, including the invention of the mirror box. Ramachandran is a disti ...
, she authored the 1998 popular science book '' Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind''.


Biography

Blakeslee is the third member of her family to specialize in science writing; her grandfather
Howard W. Blakeslee Howard Walter Blakeslee (March 21, 1880 - May 2, 1952) was an American journalist. He was the Associated Press's first full-time science reporter and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Reporting in 1937.''Who's who of Pulitzer Prize Winners'', E ...
wrote for the
Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
, and was awarded a
Pulitzer Prize for Reporting The Pulitzer Prize for Reporting was awarded from 1917 to 1947. Winners *1917: Herbert Bayard Swope, ''New York World'', for articles which appeared October 10, October 15 and from November 4 daily to November 22, 1916, inclusive, entitled, "Ins ...
in 1937, and her father, Alton L. Blakeslee, also wrote for the AP. Sandra Blakeslee was raised in
Port Washington, New York Port Washington is a Hamlet (New York), hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) on the Cow Neck Peninsula in the North Hempstead, New York, Town of North Hempstead, in Nassau County, New York, Nassau County, on the North Shore (Long Island), No ...
. She attended
Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...
for two years, before transferring to the
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
, where she majored in political science, graduating in 1965. She then joined the
Peace Corps The Peace Corps is an independent agency and program of the United States government that trains and deploys volunteers to provide international development assistance. It was established in March 1961 by an executive order of President John F. ...
, serving in
Sarawak Sarawak (; ) is a States and federal territories of Malaysia, state of Malaysia. The largest among the 13 states, with an area almost equal to that of Peninsular Malaysia, Sarawak is located in northwest Borneo Island, and is bordered by the M ...
,
Borneo Borneo (; id, Kalimantan) is the third-largest island in the world and the largest in Asia. At the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, in relation to major Indonesian islands, it is located north of Java, west of Sulawesi, and eas ...
, where she taught elementary school. Blakeslee started at the ''New York Times''
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...
bureau and city desk in 1967, before moving to the science desk in 1968. She later began writing for the ''Times'' on contract. In the 1980s, she began to specialize in neuroscience. She co-authored a series of books on marriage and divorce with psychologist Judith Wallerstein. Starting in 1995, Blakeslee began hosting a writing workshop with fellow ''Times'' writer George Johnson at the
Santa Fe Institute The Santa Fe Institute (SFI) is an independent, nonprofit theoretical research institute located in Santa Fe, New Mexico, United States and dedicated to the multidisciplinary study of the fundamental principles of complex adaptive systems, includ ...
, which awarded her a journalism fellowship in 2013. Blakeslee lives in Santa Fe. She has two children and five grandchildren. Her son, Matt Blakeslee, is also a science writer, and her co-author on the 2007 book ''The Body Has a Mind of Its Own: How Body Maps in Your Brain Help You Do (Almost) Everything Better''. Her daughter, Abi Blakeslee Kelleher, is a clinical psychologist.


Books

*''You Don't Have to Live with Cystitis! How to Avoid It—And What to Do About It'' (1986) with Larry Gillespie *''Second Chances: Men, Women and Children a Decade After Divorce'' (1989) with Judith Wallerstein *''The Good Marriage: How and Why Love Lasts'' (1995) with Judith S. Wallerstein *''Helping Your Kids Cope with Divorce the Sandcastles Way'' (1998) with Patricia Romanowski Bashe and Judith S. Wallerstein *'' Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind'' (1998) with
V. S. Ramachandran Vilayanur Subramanian Ramachandran (born 10 August 1951) is an Indian-American neuroscientist. He is known for his wide-ranging experiments and theories in behavioral neurology, including the invention of the mirror box. Ramachandran is a disti ...
*''The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: The 25 Year Landmark Study'' (2001) with Judith Wallerstein and Julia M. Lewis *''What About the Kids?: Raising Your Children Before, During and After Divorce'' (2003) *'' On Intelligence: How a New Understanding of the Brain will Lead to the Creation of Truly Intelligent Machines'' (2004) with
Jeff Hawkins Jeffrey Hawkins is a co-founder of the companies Palm Computing, where he co-created the PalmPilot, and Handspring, where he was one of the creators of the Treo.Jeff Hawkins, ''On Intelligence'', p.28 He subsequently turned to work on neurosc ...
*''The Body Has a Mind of Its Own: How Body Maps in Your Brain Help You Do (Almost) Everything Better'' (2007) with Matthew Blakeslee *'' Sleights of Mind: What the Neuroscience of Magic Reveals about Our Everyday Deceptions'' (2010) with Stephen L. Macknik and Susana Martinez-Conde


References


External links


Archived stories at the ''New York Times''Archived stories at ''Scientific American''
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Blakeslee, Sandra The New York Times writers American science writers American psychology writers UC Berkeley College of Letters and Science alumni Place of birth missing (living people) 1943 births Living people Santa Fe Institute people Women science writers American women non-fiction writers 21st-century American women