Karin Anna Reich is a German historian of mathematics.
Career
From 1967 to 1973 Reich was a scientific assistant at the Research Institute of the
Deutsches Museum in Munich and the Institute for the History of Mathematics and Natural Sciences at the
Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, where in 1973 she graduated under supervision of
Helmuth Gericke.[1][2] In 1980 she completed her time in Munich, publishing The development of
tensor calculus, in 1994 in a revised form as a book.[3]
In 1980 she became Professor of the History of Natural Science and Engineering at the
Stuttgart College of Librarianship.[3] In 1980/81 and 1981/82 she had a teaching assignment for the History of Mathematics at the
University of Heidelberg. In 1981 she represented the Department of History of Science at the
University of Hamburg.[4] In 1982, she became associate professor and in 1988 Professor for History of Mathematics at the
University of Stuttgart.[1] From 1994 until her retirement she was a professor at the Institute for the History of Natural Science, Mathematics and Engineering at the
University of Hamburg, where she succeeded
Christoph J. Scriba as director.[3]
Reich's publications include biographies of
Carl Friedrich Gauss,
Michael Stifel and
François Viète.[3] With Gericke, Reich produced an annotated translation of Viète's Analyticam In artem Isagoge from 1591.[5] She wrote a history of vector-and tensor and differential geometry. With
Kurt Vogel, Gericke and Reich reissued
Johannes Tropfke's history of elementary mathematics.[6]
Reich's books include:
Maß, Zahl und Gewicht: Mathematik als Schlüssel zu Weltverständnis und Weltbeherrschung [Measure, number and weight: Mathematics as key to understanding and mastering the world] (with Menso Folkerts and
Eberhard Knobloch, VCH, Acta Humaniora, Weinheim, 1989)[7]
Die Entwicklung des Tensorkalküls: Vom absoluten Differentialkalkül zur Relativitätstheorie [The development of tensor calculus: From the absolute differential calculus to relativity theory] (Birkhäuser, 1994)[8]
Im Umfeld der "Theoria motus": Gauß' Briefwechsel mit Perthes, Laplace, Delambre und Legendre [On matters having to do with the "Theoria motus": Gauss' correspondence with Perthes, Laplace, Delambre and Legendre] (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2001)[9]
Carl Friedrich Gauß und Russland: Sein Briefwechsel mit in Russland wirkenden Wissenschaftlern [Carl Friedrich Gauss and Russia: His correspondence with scientists working in Russia] (with Elena Roussanova, De Gruyter, 2012)[10]
Carl Friedrich Gauß und Christopher Hansteen: Der Briefwechsel beider Gelehrten im historischen Kontext [Carl Friedrich Gauss and Christopher Hansteen:A correspondence between two scholars in historical context] (with Elena Roussanova, De Gruyter, 2015)[11]
^Reich, Karin (1973). "Die Geschichte der Differentialgeometrie von Gauß bis Riemann (1828–1868)" [The History of Differential Geometry from Gauss to Riemann (1828-1868)]. Archive for History of Exact Sciences (in German). 11 (4): 273–376.
doi:
10.1007/BF00357392.
S2CID120832799.
^Review of Carl Friedrich Gauß und Christopher Hansteen by Thomas Ernst,
MR3362733
Further reading
Gudrun Wolfschmidt (eds.): "There is no particular way for kings to geometry". Festschrift for Karin Reich . Rauner, Augsburg, 2007,
ISBN978-3-936905-23-6 .
Odefey Alexander (ed.): The History of mathematical sciences. Festschrift for the 65th Karin Reich Birthday . Publisher of history of science and technology, including Diepholz, 2009,
ISBN978-3-928186-80-3 .