Written By: Annareli Morales, Curtis L. Walker, Dereka L. Carroll-Smith, and Melissa A. Burt
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| Credit: Jalen Sherald from The Inclusion Solution |
The scientific community cannot claim it is becoming a diverse and inclusive culture based on numbers alone—not if professionals who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color must leave themselves behind to be part of it.
Picture a young weather enthusiast walking across the stage to receive their meteorology degree. They feel pride in this culmination of their years of hard work. They also recall how that hard work always seemed to appear to others. Friends and family called them “proper” during visits home from school, creating a distance that lingered. Their colleagues and peers frequently offered their own unsolicited impressions:
“You are so articulate!”
“You need to be more professional…”
“You cannot show up like that.”
“You are not like those other Black people.”
Or in another common story, an early-career scientist reflects on the cost of their profession. They earned a degree, but they had to permanently relocate for school and the only career opportunities available to them. Visiting home and family is emotionally exhausting because it is a constant reminder of what was given up to focus on those limited opportunities. They raise a new family away from their abuelitos, missing out on making tamales with their tías or dancing to cumbia at their cousin’s quinciañera. As they slowly lose their grasp of their native language, they fear their children will also lose that deep connection with their Latino heritage. Sí se puede, but is it worth it?
On the surface these stories may sound and feel similar to most of us who pursued higher education or careers in academia. Who hasn’t felt inadequate, had trouble finding their place in a new environment, or ultimately felt as though they did not belong? The difference we authors want to express is that although the situations and experiences may sound similar, the consequences of these experiences for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) professionals in geosciences are very different. Additional stress, emotional labor, and baggage cause long-lasting trauma for BIPOC professionals. We feel this trauma. It is visceral. And it bubbles to the surface even as we write this article. Pursuing careers in this extremely white dominated field requires us, more often than not, to assimilate either internally or externally to the culture, to code-switch. In the process, we lose our authenticity.
This assimilation, however, is counterproductive to the creation of a richly diverse and inclusive scientific community that is prepared to address the questions of our modern world, and more importantly, it is deeply disrespectful and harmful to the BIPOC scientists whom the community boasts about recruiting. We are asking our colleagues to form a better awareness of code-switching, why BIPOC scientists perform it, and how we can address the deficiencies in our community that require it.
Read the rest of the article here: https://eos.org/opinions/code-switching-and-assimilation-in-stem-culture
3 comments :
You raise excellent points here. I am not BIPOC, but experienced a similar sense of "setting aside myself" when I began my own STEM studies in a highly male environment in university. It was like living two lives -- one where we spoke only one language and reacted in only "accepted" ways, and the other when one could be one's authentic self (I identify as female) away from the group and the classroom. It was like "Female" wasn't an acceptable way to express myself in group settings, etc.
Yet, being white, it was still much easier for me than for my counterparts who are BIPOC. I appreciate this article on many levels and intend to share it with others in my cohort.
Thank you!
Thanks so much for your thoughtful comment. I definitely agree that this idea of “setting yourself aside” applies to any marginalized group in STEM—women, LGBTQIA+ folx, people who might not speak English as their first language—and there is so much work that needs to be done in academic spaces to make sure everyone feels fully included.
As a first generation college student I felt similarly. The socio-economic differences between the Astro culture and the culture I was brought up in were so different. I felt no longer accepted at “home” and lost the deep family connection that was my upbringing. Even though I’m “white” there is no pervasive “white culture” either. Definitely code switching and loss of identity happened for me too. This is probably why mental health is so low in academia. We often end up giving up a lot to succeed.
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