The academic biosciences culture is its own strange universe. Typically, you will join a lab run by a PI (principal investigator), who is basically now your god, and you try and follow their commandments that you carve into the tablets of your brain. The lab personnel become something like your work family: you will rely on them for both reagents and knowledge. You will probably spend many long hours with these people, all of them answering to the elusive PI. The “highest most coveted goal” in the sciences is to become this PI yourself in the future, of your own lab—at least, that’s the impression you’ll get. But there are multiple trajectories to take, and it’s dumb to suggest that this is the “right” one. In the biosciences, you will have much more flexibility than your average job. You do not have to dress up for work. You can wear ripped jeans and a t-shirt, and no one cares. You can work whatever hours, no one is keeping track. If you want to work all night and sleep in the day, you can.
In this universe of your lab, the equipment you’ll use on a daily basis can cost as much as a house. The conversations you hear in the corridors, just every day prattle, would terrify someone not versed in the bubble: “oh, so they used radioactive phosphate, that makes sense.” “I think decapitating three to four should be fine.” We also work with things that could kill us. Left unbalanced, a common table top centrifuge could shoot off the bench and take someone’s head clean off— but whatever, we load that sucker up and let it fly (maybe just double check that it’s balanced). Ever envision what it would be like to die in an autoclave, or by being shut in a freezer at -80 degrees celsius? Have you decided between the two? You’ll probably have these thoughts by time you’ve worked in a lab for a year or so. Known carcinogen? No problem. Multitudes of known carcinogens that could take your sight and turn your skin to mush? Bring it on. After all, in the most traditional of science mindsets, one’s life is not of highest priority. The science is the highest priority.
I don’t agree with this idea at all, and yet it lingers like a toxic haze that everyone denies but still inhales with every breath. It’s part of what can make the science culture so frustrating. It seems like once upon a time, being obsessed with science didn’t mean selling your soul to it…or maybe it did? Maybe it did, and yet it carried a degree of respect with it? Now it carries no respect. The soul-less zombie may be the epitome of modern scientist. Yet, you’re also supposed to have something else besides a robot zombie scientist. It’s just very unclear what that “something else” is. Advice from older faculty, they will often tell you to pursue your hobbies. From younger faculty, you have hobbies? Sometimes. Working your soul to bits is required, but is not the above and beyond, even if you are working 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week. In one survival guide for scientists, they say that the “real” scientist is one who is “addicted” to science (1). If you are not an addict, this may not be a good place for you.
From me, the postdoc? I say do whatever you want. Get your work done, for sure. But clock out when you go home. Set goals daily, meet them, and then leave. Or if you don’t meet them, know where you’re going to pick up the next day. Don’t expect praise for this. Don’t expect people to say, “it’s so good you take care of your mental health or spend time with your family.” Expect to hear: “well, I worked over 85 hrs last week!” And have that be met with great praise and attention. Quietly watch that person lose their interest in science. Or not. Maybe they’re the next Nobel winner. Or maybe you’re the next Nobel winner. Honestly, no one knows. If you want to work 80 hrs a week, that’s great. The point is to not let anyone’s perception of your success motivate you besides your own perception of success. It’s probably the most accurate indicator that you have. I’ll repeat that. Your perception of your own success, whether you think you’re winning or could use a little help, is the most accurate.
Oh, guaranteed, there will be long-ass days and weeks. I’m writing this paragraph in the midst of a 15 hr day, on my phone, making sure the microscope behaves itself. But these ridiculously long days are usually the product of something working, when it’s worth it to spend the time to get the data. These days should be somewhat rare…possibly even fun? Today isn’t much fun. But these days can be. Some of my favorite graduate school memories consist of the few times I was patching neurons until midnight. To be sure, staying there that late was a choice. When the rig was humming along, I had the music going, lots of sour gummy worms and a diet cherry coke, the patches were holding nice and steady for an hour a piece, with the most spectacular currents flowing into the cell like fireworks at 0.1 Hz—everything was just right with the universe. The other side of this, of course, are all those other days when the rig is not working, and the patches aren’t holding, with or without gummy worms: then clock out by 5 (maybe 6 if there were gummy worms). (Btw: I can no longer eat sour gummy worms or drink diet cherry coke, because this disgusting flavor combination is now permanently associated with graduate school. I feel a little queasy just thinking about it.)
Publications of your work are your currency. The more you have, the better. The earlier in your career, the better. The fancier the journal they are in, the better: and there’s even a way to measure how fancy the journal is: it’s called the “impact factor.” Anything that can be quantified, because quantification makes judgement easy. And the reality is that the less people have to work to see you, the better. People do not like to work. They are too busy addicted to science. And by “work” I mean “expend any emotional intelligence.” They don’t tell you that publications are incredibly difficult to get. It helps to be on a team of scientists who all collaborate, and put together a solid piece of work. But if you find yourself the sole person of your project? A single paper can really take years, especially if it requires learning an entirely new set of skills for requested experiments.
And being the single author on a work can create, given the right circumstances, the perfect scenario for higher academia to render a talented individual invisible.
I am half Black, half white; My mom is Black, dad is white. Both are PhDs, and both worked in electrical engineering for multiple decades; science has always had a strong foothold in our house. Despite the monumental hurdles my mom faced to become a vanguard in electrical engineering of her time, my parents made a somewhat unique decision in raising my mixed-race, melanin-afied older sister and I: we didn’t have many conversations about race, and thus, I grew up quite racially illiterate (my highly discerning sis caught on several decades before I did). Identifying as a writer from an extremely young age, maybe I was so into what I was writing, and the multifarious worlds I was writing about, that “racial bias” just wasn’t on my list of things to contemplate. Why bother, when I had warrior fairies and the dilemmas of cat people to explore? I had ambitious goals and dreamed myself achieving them early and often (I’d say I probably started entertaining the dream of publishing a trilogy around 7 or 8 years old). So in this way, my mom succeeded with what she’d intended; I grew up truly believing in my limitless potential, without a single thought that the world would have any reason to doubt me.
Mom and I now have a lot of conversations about whether or not me growing up racially illiterate was a good or a bad thing. I think in her mind, it’s still a victory. “If a white person grows up racially illiterate, that maintains the status quo. If a Black person grows up racially illiterate, it’s a fucking miracle.” I agree with this sentiment, but so many incidents from my childhood could have been explained with more clarity had I known about the effects of implicit bias and microaggressions. I grew up sort of with a mental “Do Not Understand” box that I filled with experiences that made no logical sense. People designated me as rude and pushy when I was certain I’d only ever been kind. I worked hard for various opportunities that were always given to someone else. My friends would make comments that I found terribly mean and they didn’t seem to think I should care. I carved out my identity always under the ominous shadow of the words “You’re too sensitive,” “You don’t work hard enough, “You’re not enough,” “Oh, stop complaining and get over it.” Because these things often made no sense, and because I had been socialized to do so, I put them in that “Do Not Understand” box. And since the box was labeled “Do Not Understand,” I believed that this was all caused by my own stupidity and that I was at fault in some way or another for virtually all of it. This in part lead to an identity crisis and depression through out most of high school. Although my depression vanished the moment I entered college (precise reasons still unknown), this interface between the world and I persisted all the way through graduate school and even into my early postdoc years, where things were cropping up left right and center, and I repetitively kept adding them to the box and subsequently taking the blame. If I had been racially literate, this “Do Not Understand” box would have had a more accurate, more firebrand label written in thick sharpie: COVERT RACISM.
It was in my early postdoc years that I began to really do the the work and the research, and none too soon, because by this time the hidden beast was not just nibbling but taking large bites out of my career prospectives, almost bringing me to a dead end before I knew I was on a path to one. The elicited rage for the thirty-something years’ worth of apologies I’d given to maintain other peoples’ comfort lasted several months and cost me more than a couple friendships. “I’m Fine With This Andrea” is apparently much easier for people than “Empowered Andrea Now Taking Back Her Dignity and Self-Respect That She’d Squandered for Three Decades.”
One of the biggest challenges in the academic sphere is that no-one sees the covert racism for what it is, or cannot see that it is blossoming and spreading like mold across a dark, wet basement. I’ve been frequently asked, “I believe you when you say it’s there. But what does it look like? How do I point it out or call it out?”
Here are some notes that will hopefully comprise a rough “beginners guide to covert racism in academia” *Cue trumpets*
>First, understand that it’s near impossible to “call out” most of the time, because it can always be explained through other means. If you can call it out and have the energy for that fight, do so, but understand the accusation might look ludicrous to those who can’t see it. A better approach might just be to aim your actions in opposition to the system.
> Race is never mentioned or even thought about. In covert racism, no one is ever thinking, “I don’t like your dark skin, so…” It is entirely comprised of subconscious reactions to a system where a group of individuals has been socialized into believing in their superiority and how much “special treatment” they deserve, or what they should “naturally have,” and another group has been socialized into being “lesser, and less deserving.” Skin color is the salient feature of this artificial hierarchy to trigger these subconscious patterns without our awareness.
>The presence of covert racism can be tracked by an overt end result. For instance, because it is on many people’s minds these days, an end result might be the abysmally low percentage of academic tenure track faculty currently hired from underrepresented backgrounds. No one can deny it. Those numbers are solid and unchanging. The underlying instances that lead to this end result can always be explained by something other than race: “not good fit, low productivity, another candidate was just way better…” And then those underlying steps can always be explained by something other than race: “we just don’t have the resources to support you/your project, you were just unlucky to have to work on that project alone, you wanted to be with your family, so…”
>It is the patterns that count. All explanations aside, if you carefully track who is chosen for representation, who wins certain awards, who is pushed into the spotlight, who is associated with positive words, who is associated with mentorship and support, who is pushed and challenged, aka all the necessary things for momentum in a scientific career, verses who is ignored and left to fend for themselves, the statistics are very clear. Over the years, all of these patterns take devastating tolls.
>On the surface level, how others describe the situation means little to nothing. The ultimate outcome will determine what patterns are underlying in an institution.
>These patterns can be tracked even to the smallest detail. For example, a common academic practice is for people in power to describe trainees as “talented” in seminars and emails. But not everyone gets the “talented” description. Who does, and who doesn’t? And why? At a national conference poster contest (even at the undergraduate level), who is winning the prizes, and why?
>To combat the end result begins with paying attention to the smallest details and making conscious decisions to promote, rather than ignore, put down, or leave aside, individuals of color. And every time you do ignore, put down, or leave aside a POC, even if that wasn’t your intention and you mean no harm, notice it.
>Deliberately promote the work of people of color. Deliberately describe people of color as “brilliant,” “talented.” When a POC is speaking, do not interrupt them and call out those who do. Actively listen and actively think about their goals. Do not assume “Oh, they’re fine and well enough to do without your input.”
> The things a POC says in sincerity should never be fodder for your next joke. Not only does that downplay the truth of what they are saying, but it draws attention away from them, and back to you. You have enough attention.
> Deliberately seek their advice and opinions. Put their names out there because you can. Deliberately give them credit…for anything! Even if something in you is against doing this: what you are fighting internally against is the status quo. Maybe if you do this enough times, your brain might do the holy plasticity thing and actually realize that now they have a similar level of support as everyone else, the people you’ve been passing off as “mediocre” are actually more talented than those you’ve been labelling as “talented.” And no: I do not count posting random articles on social media as doing the work of social justice unless the articles are about people you know and want to promote. This work is done in private.
> The phrases “That’s how it is,” or “That’s how this works” scream that something probably should be re-worked or evaluated for how it is affecting people of color. A POC’s life in general is different than yours. Chances are, the system has been deliberately built to exclude POC, based on these life differences, and then explained for their importance to science in some other stupid way.
>The phrase “So it had absolutely nothing to do with race,” means: “it has everything to do with race, please let me subconsciously bury it behind something else.”
> If you want to look for your own biases, there are tons of implicit bias tests available free online, but I personally think every email you write is a good place to start . Draft an email, especially if you’re sending it to a person of color. Then think of someone you really admire and look up to: a master of your field, for example. Write the same email as if you were sending it to that person you think is simply amazing. Then compare the two. Not the same, are they? To do the hard work, make the former email closer to the latter. It doesn’t mean you go overboard with the flattery, but I’m willing to bet you’ll be able to add just a touch more basic respect. When POC read your emails, we see and feel your lack of respect, even if you were thinking you were just writing something nice and sweet.
>If you find yourself justifying something you did or said that did not make your POC friend smile at all, rather the opposite (but you thought it was really good!), check in with yourself how much you like participating in the system. If actually, you’d rather not participate in the system, ask what you’re willing to give up to act against it. Truly acting against the system requires a solid ego check and a lot of humility. It should not feel good. This work is not a dopamine hit. It’s a long, steady process of self-bettering.
Some terminology:
Microaggression: I define a microaggression as anything that makes one feel as though they don’t belong “in the room” or that they are invisible. Microaggressions can come in all variety of shapes and sizes; even sound like compliments! Or they can involve no words at all. Anyone can perpetrate a microaggression and anyone can be on the receiving end of them. They generally imply a lack of respect. To me, one of the hallmarks of a microaggression is that by skimming the surface, of course, it has absolutely nothing to do with race or any type of marginalized group that is not the status quo. Microaggressions are unintentional and subconscious, and the perpetrators often pose themselves as the largest champions for racial justice. Multitudes of explanations and excuses can be used to explain a microaggression. Where they acquire their more sinister meaning is in the patterns of their usage (i.e. when I say “x,” someone always seems to say “y”). To feel the effects of microaggression means being subjected to them over a long period of time. The real damage from microaggressions comes from accumulated, repetitive exposure.
Many of the more “classic” examples of microaggression that directly hinge on race (i.e. “No, where are you really from?”) I would classify as more MACROaggressions. Although they can be hard to call out in the moment too, I find them less mysterious and I can see the true intentions with more clarity.
Microaggressions are the murky, muddy ones. They are extremely difficult to detect, and near-impossible to catch in the moment. Like said, by my definition, they often can only be brought to light once the repetitive pattern becomes clear. Before catching them, they are like a mysterious stomachache that creeps up after a delicious but not so healthy meal. One might be having a great conversation with colleagues, but once you come home or sign off the call, you feel really awful, even though there’s no clear reason why. “Why do I suddenly feel like such a failure? I was just chatting with friends.” The “death by a thousand paper cuts” description definitely applies— only, you often can’t see the paper cuts enough to clean and patch them up until you’re bleeding copiously into unconsciousness.
To call out a microaggression is not to call out a single incident, but an underlying recurring theme or pattern. Near 100% of the time, that recurring theme aligns beautifully with a culture’s typical racial biases; implying a person is incompetent, incapable, or otherwise not deserving of respect as the racial majority.
Invalidation: Invalidations are a type of microaggression. In my mind, these are specifically moments when you are shining and others are determined to have you not shine—or at the very least, have you be more like everyone else. They work especially well to reinstate a social hierarchy. I.e. You make a bold statement in a meeting that challenges the status quo, and someone else in that meeting says in response, “No. That can’t be true,” without really contemplating the substance you are sharing.
Feeling invisible: This is also a “type” of “microaggression,” maybe leaning a little more “macro” at times, especially when it has direct career implications. Your name is left off work it should be on, someone else was given an award that you deserved, etc.
One of the fundamental concepts of all of these incidents is often the immediate desire of the person on the receiving end to restore quiet and simply take the hit. It is much easier to say: “Oh. I guess what I said was really dumb.” “Oh, I guess I was too full of myself and I didn’t really deserve that award.” “I guess I don’t really belong here,” because over years of socialization, it’s what we’re taught to do so that others can be comfortable. It is so much easier to apologize or see oneself as being “lesser.” This reinstates to social hierarchy, and everyone is “happy.” People of color become so used to saying this about themselves, it becomes a part of the pattern, living in a perpetual state of being “in the wrong.”
To challenge these patterns is not fun. I hate it. It’s so draining. I wish so much that I could just do science as others do, without the slightest mental energy given to trying to weed out my colleagues’ good company from their microaggressions. But it is necessary for advancement. For my colleagues of color, this is a balancing act, a knife edge to walk every day. The balance is not between calling it out or not calling it out—save that for when you actually have that extra energy to call it out—but when to believe, when to not believe, or some hybrid: “Yes, I really could have worked more on x, y, and z, but this person would never had made such a remark if I’d been white.” Trying to work through this knife-edge dance is specific to the experience of being a minority, navigating microaggresion-laden waters. Victimization is not the same as demanding respect.
Within academic culture, while I’ve experienced a share of overt sexism, I’ve never experienced overt racism. That said, my daily existence swims in covert racism and the subtle hints that “you don’t belong here.” For me, this takes the form of being left out of email threads, my name taken off public documents that have my work on them, being denied credit for my work, being talked over, repeating myself multiple times and still not being heard, having my work minimized, or receiving an invalidating remark thrown out often times after I’ve said or done anything important. I think another contributor is a sense of non-belonging in a culture that often exuberantly worships the ideals of whiteness (be the smartest, loudest, most demanding, “get what I want, mock whom I want, say what I want, with no repercussions” etc.) while as an almost pathological empath, I struggle to embody any of these philosophies. Somehow, though, I start feeling like my quiet humility is actually perceived as a threat, as weird and contrary as that might seem, and then I’m being hit with resentment. But I don’t think I’m alone in that. The old world of science buckles at the thought of bright women of color coming to take spots once exclusively reserved for white men, and is filled with all sorts of traps and put downs to keep the status quo in place. These little jabs hurt, and there is no way to become “less sensitive” to them. The idea of “toughening up” and to “not be such a snowflake” is a white supremacist mindset that cannot tolerate being in the wrong, because they’ve never had to develop a stomach for being in the wrong and can’t tolerate the feeling of it (while we’re like—heh. Welcome to my daily existence of being in your perceived “wrong.”) In fact, perhaps the only way to be successful in this kind of environment is to be fully sensitive to these barbs, because if you’re sensitive and they hurt, then you probably at some level know they are in place to protect a lie (2).
To my woman of color colleagues: The simple truth is that you cannot expect praise for your work here. This has nothing to do with you, or your work. If you feel your work minimized, remember: it is not you, it is the system. You must visualize yourself surrounded by a culture that sees your advancement and brilliance as a threat, and silently does not want you to succeed, though it would never say that to your face and would in fact deny it at great lengths. As you achieve in the sciences, and can clearly see your achievements, your colleagues are generally not thinking about all the merits of your work, or what you’ve achieved, or done. Mostly likely, they are thinking about what kind of sandwich they want, or their next experiment, or the bad weather—or even more likely, their own struggles and dilemmas in life, because life is hard—for everyone. Their busy brains are processing all of their life’s shit—and let’s be honest, a bunch of shit they probably can’t control too. They simply can’t expend the energy to see beyond stereotype, which takes much less processing power. It is beyond them to see the obvious: that you have probably outperformed many of your peers. The stereotype says this would be an unheard-of feat for any minority, warranting its own sappy Hollywood film, and couldn’t really exist in the mundane life experience. Yet, when you do need help, or things are not going well (as they inevitably will at some point, because that’s the nature of science), then it is much easier to fill that stereotype with the conventional Black woman can’t figure something out. This is much easier for non-minority brains to process, so you’ll probably see behavior that makes more sense. If something is not going well, do expect some consolation and help. But when you are shining, do not expect anyone to see your gleam through the white opaqued lenses of their subconscious glasses. Understand that this is the last indication that you should leave the sciences.
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Rosei, Federico and Tudor Johnson. Survival Skills for Scientists. London: Imperial College Press, 2006
- Cose, Ellis. The Rage of a Privileged Class. New York: HarperCollins, 1994.
Andrea L McQuate 