Check out our Science Literacy Week display in the Nook of the UTSC Library. The display has books, math stickers, and 3D printed models.

Check out these books, articles, and other resources from the UTSC Library collections to get a sense of how mathematics is connected to daily life and the disciplines taught across campus.

Jump to a section of this page using the links below:

General | Anthropology | Biological Sciences | Chemistry | Co-op | Entrepreneurship | Environmental Science | Health & Society | Historical & Cultural Studies | Human Geography | Language Studies | Management | Physics and Astrophysics | Political Science | Psychology and Neuroscience | Sociology | UTSC Mathematical Publications

These popular works highlight the power of mathematics in people's lives.

Anthropologists and archaeologists use statistical approaches and mathematical models to explore evolutionary theory and human variation, to analyze skeletal or archaeological samples, and to express the concepts forming idea systems that make up the culture of groups.

Mathematics in Biological Sciences helps to make discoveries and gain new insights into the world with modeling of biological processes, understanding how molecules are transported in cells and other physiological processes, studying DNA, statistical significance of various research and experimentations, learning about diseases, and more!  

Mathematics is used widely in chemistry and is necessary to explore important concepts. Without basic math, making calculations within chemistry will be extremely difficult.

(Source: 2: The Mathematics of Chemistry is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA  license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Elizabeth Gordon) 

Students in Arts, Science and Management Co-op find that math can be useful to analyze and solve problems. How math concepts are applied on the job is determined by the student’s discipline, the type of job, and the industry and organization in which they are placed. 

Entrepreneurs and leaders within the startup space require mathematical literacy to solve business problems. They need to have an understanding of finance concepts and statistics in order to price products, forecast revenues and expenses, and make sense of the market fluctuations in their industry. 

Math is used in a wide variety of ways in environmental science, from counting the number of species in an ecosystem to complex equations and mathematical models used to examine topics such as climate change, ecological processes and environmental impacts.  

In public health, statistical models are used to test the influence of biological, environmental, demographic, and behavioural factors on a disease, and mathematical modelling is used to predict the evolution of epidemics. The results can help inform policy, programs, and practice. 

Math can be useful for analyzing and interpreting statistics in Historical and Cultural Studies, and for understanding and communicating information in quantitative forms, such as charts and graphs.  

Mathematics is important in Human Geography to explore topics such as spatial patterns, human impacts and interactions with the environment, and societal change through statistical analysis and GIS to measure spatial questions.  

Mathematics is applied in Language Studies to explore linguistic components and patterns from phonology to semantics, particularly in computational linguistics. 

Management includes various business and social science disciplines such as Accounting, Economics, Finance, Organizational Behaviour, Marketing, and Strategic Management. In the world of business, math can be useful to balance and reconcile statements, design quantifiable economic experiments, analyze financial data patterns, study human behaviour in organizations, analyze marketing and distribution chains, and make leadership decisions. 

Math and physics are two closely connected fields. For physicists, math is a tool used to understand the ideas of physics, such as quantum theory. 

Math and statistics are used in a variety of ways in Political Science in including examining opinions and voting patterns of a particular population, and predicting how this might affect community (municipal, provincial, federal). 

Mathematics is used to carry out statistical analysis within studies of the mind and behaviour, as well as for computational modelling of cognitive processes. 

Sociologists use math and statistics to analyze and understand social behaviours and interactions.