Mariana Smit Vega Garcia is an Assistant Professor at Western Washington University, working in geometric analysis and partial differential equations. In this interview, Mariana speaks, among other things, about her math-life balance, the experience of representing different minorities and the joy of teaching mathematics. In addition: lots of friendly advice for undergrads!

Mariana's webpage: http://faculty.wwu.edu/smitvem/​
Photo: from Mariana's webpage

0:00​ teaser
0:44​ didn’t want to be a professor
3:28​ trying to find math-life balance
9:10​ collaborators are friends
13:06​ mathematician-extrovert
16:05​ experiencing sexism
19:10​ burden of representing a minority
21:38​ insecurities in math
27:09​ joy of teaching
30:07​ motivation to do research
34:28​ algebraic vs analytic worlds
38:35​ pessimism in research
40:31​ we are more than our math
44:22​ moving around the world
49:35​ advice for students from faraway
52:32​ initiatives for minorities
58:32​ what students have to know
1:00:08​ final advice