Assignment 7

Drawings of scientists

My Drawing

Gender: Male

Age: 60s

Facial expression: poker faced

Clothing: Lab coat over button down shirt and dress pants

Grooming: Silver hair slicked to the side like a stone-cold silver fox. Clean shaven.

Height: Medium stature

Skin color: White

Eye color: Brown

Build: Thin, but not scrawny

My Friend's Drawing

Gender: Male

Age: 60s

Facial expression: sinister or frustrated?

Clothing: Lab coat buttoned up

Grooming: Bald. Moustache.

Height: Medium stature

Skin color: White

Eye color: N/A

Build: Scrawny

When I look at these drawings and think about the scientists I interact with daily I find them to be quite similar. First, and most strikingly obvious, is their skin color. In the chemistry department every professor is white with one exception of a Latina professor. My experience in the biology department has been with all white professors although I have only had a few bio classes. My two math teachers have been white.The list goes on like that. Not just in the sciences, but in all of higher education. We are used to being taught by white people, especially men (although the gender trend is shifting, I believe, more quickly then the racial trend).
Both my friend's drawing and mine were of males. I thought about drawing a woman when I first got the assignment to draw a scientist, but I thought that would be odd for me to do that as a male. I am not sure why that is. Maybe I somehow expect that as a male I should aspire to follow male scientists as role models, which may speak to a deep-rooted expectation of gender roles in my life.

Age was another striking thing. I am used to looking up to older white, males as my science teachers. In high school my two favorite science teachers were older white men and the same can be said for my two favorite science teachers here, as well.

Neither my friend and I drew the "wacky scientist" though. This makes sense since we are both science people. While I know many eccentric scientists I do not know many with the Einstein hair and badly-matched clothing. My friend's drawing did have a sinister expression, but I think he was trying to make him appear as if he was thinking hard. Neither he or I are particularly good artists.

Finally, the lab coat is important. I have only seen one professor on campus in a lab coat so I don't know where this idea really comes from. I guess it is more of an identifier for the person viewing the drawing. Once you see a lab coat it becomes obvious what the artist is trying to convey about the identity and role of that person even if many scientists don't actually wear a lab coat.

As a science writer, the stereotypes represented by these drawings can make our view of interviewees more narrow then it should be. When seeking out experts we are looking for someone who looks like an expert. I expect a sagacious, aged man in a lab coat to sit me down and tell me all I need to know about some complex subject. But this is a prejudice I (and other people) need to rid myself of. Scientists come in all colors, genders, and ages. Some of the brightest professors on this campus are extremely young (only 10 or 15 years older than me). One of our most qualified chemistry professors (she graduated from Oxford) is a young woman. Why I assume intelligence comes with age is an old idea that must be thrown out. I cannot carry a bias when listening to an expert opinion just because a person is in their 30's rather than their 50's, or is a woman rather than a man.

I think an notable prejudice that people carry when considering what scientists are like cannot be easily conveyed in a drawing. Scientists are typically thought of as eccentric, impersonal people with few friends and an obsession for their work. While science certainly attracts a good deal of eccentrics and socially-awkward people there are many great scientists who are just normal people. Scientists are thought to only advance their work without considerations of the ethical implications, but the scientists I know are people with families and homes and lives. They are people who put family and community first. They constantly question the ethical dilemmas that science brings with it and encourage their students to do the same. I hope that as a science writer I can come to recognize every person as a potential science expert because physical characteristics do not make the expert; it's about what they know that counts.