Material

Introduction

This is a repository of a diverse range of contributors and innovators in computing, with a particular focus on practitioners of non-western heritage who may be less well known. This is an open, publicly available resource. The learning outcomes are listed below.

You can follow the links below to start reading about the featured figures. Entries are categorised and tagged following the ACM Computing Classification System (2025).

Quick links

Mathematics of computing

Networks

Artificial intelligence

Map

Figure 1: Interactive map showing approximate origins of figures in this repository. (Google Maps, 2025)
View on Google Maps ↗ | View on Google Earth ↗

Contacts and links 

Please contact us with any queries or comments, or to suggest any figures you would like to see included. 

Email: diversity-repository@open.ac.uk

Link to this material at: https://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/diverse-computing-pioneers

Material acknowledgements

For third party images and material used.

Google Maps (2025) Diversity in computing, Available from: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1rV91u5BoOgKzJV49pVG3zsvJyUb7NCE&ll=23.436471444885502%2C72.04463720000001&z=2 (Accessed 21 February 2025)

TechCrunch (2021) File:Timnit Gebru crop.jpg. Available at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Timnit_Gebru_crop.jpg (Accessed: 31 January 2025)

Wikimedia Commons (2024) File:Srinivasa Ramanujan-Add. MS a94 version2 (cropped).jpg. Available at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Srinivasa_Ramanujan-Add._MS_a94_version2_(cropped).jpg (Accessed 18 January 2025)

Wikipedia (2023) File:Photograph of Narinder Singh Kapany, the father of fibre optics.jpg. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Photograph_of_Narinder_Singh_Kapany,_the_father_of_fibre_optics.jpg (Accessed: 06 February 2025)

日本学士院 (2022) File:Junichi Nishizawa.jpg. Available at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Junichi_Nishizawa.jpg (Accessed 09 February 2025)

General references and further reading

Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) (2025) ACM Computing Classification System. Available at: https://dl.acm.org/ccs (Accessed 19 February 2025)

Carnegie Corporation of New York (2024) Great Immigrants. Available at: https://www.carnegie.org/awards/award/great-immigrants/ (Accessed 02 February 2025)

Computer History Museum (CHM) (2025) Remarkable People. Available at: https://computerhistory.org/blog/category/remarkable-people/ (Accessed 19 January 2025)

QMUL Faculty of Science and Engineering (2025) Schools' EDI Resources. Available at: https://www.seresearch.qmul.ac.uk/pce/ediresources/ (Accessed 27 January 2025)

Gladstone, J. R. and Cimpian, A. (2021) 'Which role models are effective for which students? A systematic review and four recommendations for maximizing the effectiveness of role models in STEM', IJ STEM Ed 8 (59). Available at: https://doi.org/10.1186/s40594-021-00315-x (Accessed 05 June 2025)

Nájera, J. and Vida, M. (2022) The forgotten story of the women who changed the history of computing in Latin America. Available at: https://globalvoices.org/2022/07/13/the-forgotten-story-of-the-women-who-changed-the-history-of-computing-in-latin-america/ (Accessed 04 February 2025)

Nakamura, L. (2014) Indigenous Circuits. Available at: https://computerhistory.org/blog/indigenous-circuits/ (Accessed 04 February 2025)

Contributors

Amaninder Singh, Brent Cunningham, Kate Feliciello, Andrew Smith, Zoe Tompkins as part of the Teaching Assessment Learning and Curriculum working group within the Awarding Gaps Implementation Group (AGIG)