Research Comms Podcast: Raven The Science Maven
“Prior to all these movements occurring I think it was very difficult for black people in STEM to find each other. We didn’t know that we had such a large community”. Raven Baxter on the growing sense of online solidarity amongst Black scientists.
This week’s guest is Raven Baxter, aka Raven the Science Maven. Raven is a molecular biologist and science communicator who, as well as sharing her love of science with the world, is also a huge champion of greater diversity in the STEM sector.
Her rap song ‘Big Ole Geeks’ that was a viral hit last year, aimed to question stereotypical views of how scientists should look and behave. She recently gave a TEDx talk about the narrow way in which scientists are represented in the media, and she is also the founder and organiser of #BlackInSciCommWeek that has been billed as an opportunity for Black science communicators to recenter their voices after the traumatic events of the past several months, to amplify existing Black ‘scicommers’ and to provide support and training for new, upcoming Black communicators of science.
The below interview has been edited and condensed for the sake of space. To hear everything that Raven had to say in the interview please check out the podcast!
As a Black woman, what has your experience of the STEM world been like?
When I was a kid I wanted to be an astronaut and that eventually evolved into my desire to be a scientist in general. I pursued that, I went to college, I got a Bachelor's and Master's degree in biology and I largely had really awesome experiences as a student.
But all of that really changed once I got into the corporate space, into the professional STEM work environment. And it was a complete shock to me. Because I was different I was made to feel like I didn't belong. And ultimately what ended up happening was that some things were said to me that were very inappropriate and made me feel like I really didn't belong and I left and that's the story for many people in STEM.
The culture of STEM is so exclusive, it can be very closed to people who don't fit a certain criteria. And although these people deserve to be in these spaces and positions in STEM and they've worked hard and have the qualifications to be there, and they're passionate about what they do, it's often not enough.
And some people have to shift their identities and negotiate who they are and assimilate just to accomplish their career in science and that can be very painful and traumatic. There's a lot of research that shows that, so I took it upon myself to recognize that this is an issue happening in STEM and do something about it.
I don't like being a victim. I think that if you're presented with an issue, if you have some sort of power to create positive change to help solve the problems that you're experiencing, you should at least try to do that. And so a lot of what I do as a scientist and science communicator is making STEM culture what I think it needs to be.
Have you listened to these other episodes of the Research Comms podcast?
How important has the recent growth in online events supporting and celebrating Black scientists and nature enthusiasts like BlackInNeuro, BlackInNature and BlackBirdersWeek?
Prior to all of these movements it was very difficult for Black people in STEM to find each other. We didn't know that we had such a large community and that is a result of the expectation of assimilation.
As far as your identity goes, in regards to your ethnicity and your ethnic culture, it has really been an expectation that you could not be your unapologetic self as you're pursuing your STEM career.
When #BlackBirdersWeek started it was started because someone called the cops on somebody who they thought could not possibly be enjoying nature. You know, someone saw a Black man and wanted to threaten them with potential engagement with law enforcement, all because they did not match their perception of what a bird enthusiast looked like.
And that is the result of what has been perpetuated in society through mainstream media, through messaging from the powers-that-be, who decide who gets to be seen as a scientist and a nature enthusiast.
So #BlackBirdersWeek started as a direct result of that incident in New York and what came out of that was this epiphany that we can no longer just abide by these invisible boxes that are placed on us as a culture, as Black people. We just have to show up as we are and really make the statement that, ‘Hey we're here, we do this science. This is our community and we love each other and we support each other. And you can like it or leave it but we're not gonna tolerate you excluding us anymore. We're going to make ourselves known.’ And that is why you're now seeing a renaissance of visibility of Black people in STEM and it's very important.
So what are your hopes for #BlackInSciCommWeek?
It’s not just inspired by movements like BlackBirdersWeek and BlackInNeuro etc. BlackInSciComm started because of the need for our community to really take a step back and recenter our voices.
In America we've had a very upsetting year. Unfortunately there have been more reasons for the Black Lives Matter movement to have an uprising and that is because of police brutality and also people murdering each other based on the color of their skin.
As you know, Covid-19 is disproportionately affecting the Black community in America. So we just have layer upon layer of things that are just piling on top of each other and we have to talk about these things every time something comes up. As science communicators we often have to abandon our platforms when issues affect us in our communities. We have to stop communicating and talking about science so that we can fight for our lives - literally - and talk about human rights, and why people need to have basic human decency, and love and respect one another.
And all of that is done because some of us really do fear for our safety and well-being, and that is an incredible pressure to be under and that is a pressure that we experience on a day-to-day basis, and it's very exhausting.
And I realized I hadn't been talking about science for months. Everything that I had been talking about was related to race relations, diversity issues, offering solutions for those things, and having constructive dialogues around those things. But we're not talking about science. That's a problem when you're a science communicator and that's what you're passionate about.
So I had a conversation with a few other science communicators in the Black community and we all felt tired, and really had a yearning for getting back to what we love the most and that is science communication.
And once I learned that other people were having the same experience as I was, I decided to create a week solely focused on Black science communicators. To reset their sights back onto science and also to create an opportunity for new science communicators to get training and make connections. We want to amplify Black voices in science communication and connect people together, so we're going to have panels, workshops, we’ll have mixers and parties, and we're also doing an outreach event at the end of the week.
It's a week that’s little different from other BlackInX Weeks because we're very heavy on workshops and our intention is to build new science communicators while nourishing the existing Black science communication community.
Research Comms is presented by Peter Barker, director of Orinoco Communications, a digital communications and content creation agency that specialises in helping to communicate research. Find out how we’ve helped research organisations like yours by taking a look at past projects…
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