Suzanne Pierre
  • Home
  • Research
    • Peer-Reviewed Papers
  • Equity in Science
  • Media
    • Writings
    • Recordings
    • Events
  • Critical Ecology Lab
  • Home
  • Research
    • Peer-Reviewed Papers
  • Equity in Science
  • Media
    • Writings
    • Recordings
    • Events
  • Critical Ecology Lab

WRITING

Belowground Activity

2/15/2018

2 Comments

 
This essay was originally written for and published in Loam Magazine: Reawakening Resilience.
Soil has always been among my favorite things. Its sweet and full smell has always been intoxicating. The colors within it span a spectrum from creamy taupe to vibrant ochre and the bright black of a dying ember. When held, its cold weight in your hand is a reminder of how much water, and life, it contains. I came to love soil because of intuition, disposition, and luck. My hands met soil because my parents bought a house in the suburbs after years of living in an East Coast city. They moved to a place with groves of trees and occasional farms because they wanted a good life for their children. The good life, it seemed, was nearer to soil. So through happenstance and proximity, I become acquainted with the earth’s skin. As my parents dug deep into the ground to plant gardens in our new suburban space, I found myself increasingly familiar with the dead and dying material under my often-bare feet.
In college, I found myself thinking more about how to turn my familiarity with nature and love of asking questions into a career. I was fortunate to find people who encouraged that interest, and I found my way to graduate school to study forest ecosystems. But as I went from being a lover of nature to an expert, I began to see that my aspiration to be an ecologist was not just anomalous, but a disturbance to a much larger structure. It wasn’t just unique that a young girl with brown skin and thick, curly hair fell in love with soil, or that she even that she transmuted that love into a job. It struck me that the rarity of women of color becoming environmental experts was no accident, but by design.

Read More
2 Comments

    Intent

    To document interesting ideas about science and nature  and reflect on the experience of being a scientist from the margins. 

    Archives

    March 2021
    February 2018
    June 2017
    November 2016
    August 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    August 2015
    May 2015
    March 2015

    Categories

    All
    Black In STEM
    Conversations
    Diversity
    Educatiom
    Education
    Ethics
    Graduate School
    Learning
    Molecular Biology
    Nature
    Professionalism
    Progress
    Publishing
    Resources And Advice
    Science
    Science Communication
    Success
    The Struggle
    Women In Science
    Ya Messed Up Kid

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.