Education
- BMath - University of Waterloo
- MA - University of Toronto
- PhD - University of Toronto
Research interests
Scott M. Campbell, Director of the Centre for Society, Technology and Values (CSTV), has been teaching at CSTV since 2007. His research revolves around the history of computing technology and science in Canada, and more broadly the role of technology in Canadian society. He is also the curator of the University of Waterloo Computer Museum.
He recently published an article about the history of Waterloo Fortran (WATFOR), a student-oriented Fortran compiler first created by four undergraduates at the University of Waterloo in 1965, followed by many other educational languages and application packages. These helped put Waterloo on the map and establish its reputation for innovation. Another recent article, “Backwater Calculations for the St. Lawrence Seaway and the First Computer in Canada”, is an examination of the role of electronic computing methods in the planning of the St. Lawrence Seaway, to be published in the Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering. As well, a monograph, Computing in Canada: Building a Digital Future, covering the breadth of computing history in Canada from the mid 1940s to the late 1980s, co-authored with Zbigniew Stachniak of the York University Computer Museum, was published by the Canada Science and Technology Museum in 2009.
His 2006 doctoral dissertation, The Premise of Computer Science: Establishing Modern Computing at the University of Toronto (1945-1964) details the first Canadian attempts to join the world of modern computing in the decades after WWII, and culminates with the first graduate computer science department in Canada at the University of Toronto, and several other undergraduate departments at the University of Alberta, the University of Western Ontario, and the University of Waterloo.
Selected writings
- Campbell, Scott M., "Backwater calculations for the St. Lawrence Seaway with the first computer in Canada,'' Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering, Vol. 36, No. 7, (July 2009), pp. 1164–1169.
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Stachniak, Zbigniew and Scott M. Campbell, Computing in Canada: Building a Digital Future, Transformation Series, Canada Science and Technology Science Museum, Ottawa, (2009).
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Campbell, Scott M. "On the Absence of Obsolescence'', IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, (accepted Oct–Dec 2009).
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Campbell, Scott M. and Zbigniew Stachniak, “Computing in Canada”, Historical Assessment, Canada Science and Technology Museum, 2007.
- Campbell, Scott M. “The Premise of Computer Science: Establishing Modern Computing at the University of Toronto (1945-1964)”, Doctoral Dissertation, University of Toronto, 2006.
- Campbell, Scott M., “Beatrice Helen Worsley: Canada's Female Computer Pioneer”, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, volume 25, no. 4 (Oct-Dec 2003), p.51–62