This is a beautiful memoir/essay by Brandon Taylor, a novelist and a former graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison:
...Science was beautiful and it was wild and it was unknowable. Science was spending days and weeks on a single experiment with no way to know if it would work and no real way to tell if it had worked. Science was like trying to find your way to a dark forest only to realize that you had always been inside of the forest and that the forest is inside of another, greater, darker forest. Science was laughing with my labmates about television the night before, about the song of the summer, about tennis, about the unruly nature of mold growing on our plates, about cheap wings at Buffalo Wild Wings. Science was being taught to think. Taught to speak. Science was a finishing school. Science was a brutal education. Science made me ruthless. Science made me understand the vast beauty of the world.
But science was also working 15 hours a day for weeks or months. Science was working weekends and holidays. Science was being called lazy for taking a break. Science was the beat of doubting silence after I answered a question put to me. Science was being told that racism was not racism. Science was being told that I was fortunate that I had running water while growing up and that I was actually privileged because there are some places that do not. Science was being told that I was mistaken for a waiter at a party because I had worn a black sweater. Science was being told that I had to work harder despite working my hardest. Science was being told that I talked too much...I thought Brandon's essay rang true for so many reasons, and I enjoyed reading the whole thing. I hope you do too.
My advisor was a sadistic asshole. If I was black, I would have been convinced he was a racist. I think grad school is just unpleasant as hell and can look an awful lot like racism, sexism, etc if you're trying to figure out why your PI irrationally hates your guts no matter how hard you try to please him.
ReplyDeleteWhy not both? There is no doubt that the sciences have a diversity problem. Imagine the normal challenges of dealing with difficulties and unfairness in science along with the difficulties and unfairness of being "other" in our society.
DeleteDefinitely true. My academic friends are woke AF on Facebook, but behind closed doors, it's "we all know Professor X is a creep and makes female students uncomfortable, but we're going to sweep those complaints under the rug because he brings in a lot of funding."
DeleteI had a really dark, awful time in grad school; I definitely had/have PTSD from my time there and this hit me right in the feels. Took me years to get over it and ruined plenty of relationships and it likely changed me for life in a negative way. I survived and have to tell myself that every day and it is still very difficult to look at things positively. My biggest regret in life is being naturally curious and thinking I could tame science.
ReplyDeleteThat's funny. I regret being a curious myself (Im a 55 yo post, or rather, perma-doc). Science is great if you are faculty who can never lose his/her job and have decent pay, but for just about everybody down below doing the experiments the low pay and crappy advising is not worth placating your curiosity.
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