NOW we are halfway through 2023, I can confess to something that astute readers may have already noticed: I made it my mission to return to basic and foundational questions in physics this year. Some of this was motivated by teaching a quantum mechanics course for the first time earlier this year. But it was also possibly due to the theoretical physicist鈥檚 version of a midlife crisis. As I revealed last month in my Substack newsletter, I have been formally awarded tenure and will be promoted to associate professor as of August. I am officially mid-career.
Since 麻豆传媒 has a global readership, let me translate a little. Whereas university faculty in the UK, for instance, go through a probationary 鈥渓ecturer鈥� phase, in the US and Canada, faculty begin as assistant professors. After five or six years, they go up for tenure. At this point, a substantial document known as a tenure dossier is submitted that outlines contributions to teaching, research and service to the institution and intellectual community. Mine was almost 400 pages.
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My department has a committee that read my dossier alongside letters they solicited from academics in my discipline asking them about my impact on the field, as well as letters from my current and former students. After this, the committee made a recommendation, which went to the full department, who passed it to a school committee, who then passed it to the dean, who then passed it to the provost, who then made a final recommendation to the university鈥檚 governing board. It is an involved process that takes about a whole academic year.
I went up for tenure in secret because the current conditions for employees like me at US public universities are such that I wanted to avoid political interference from people who feel threatened by my scholarship. I wanted my case to be considered on its merits and I didn鈥檛 want ignorant, bad faith actors to have a say in whether I obtained what the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) defines as, 鈥渁n indefinite appointment that can be terminated only for cause or under extraordinary circumstances such as financial exigency and program discontinuation鈥�.
When I say that I wanted to avoid political interference, I don鈥檛 mean that I think tenure isn鈥檛 political. As AAUP states: 鈥淭he principal purpose of tenure is to safeguard academic freedom, which is necessary for all who teach and conduct research in higher education.鈥�
It is easy to wonder why a scientist would ever worry about this. Just ask Galileo Galilei, is an easy retort. Galileo was famously persecuted by the Catholic church for 23 years before finally being sentenced to house arrest for life. But that is an example from the 17th century. More recently, in 2016, the world watched as a minority of people in the US elected a president who was openly hostile to the scientific consensus about global warming and the need for environmental protections.
For me, there is more to the story than worrying about hostility to science. I have received some vocal feedback from readers who are unhappy when I mention that I am not a straight white man. But I am not, and it is relevant to my life as a scientist. Actually, when I earned tenure, I became the first Black woman (in global history, as far as is known) to do so in either particle theory or theoretical cosmology. I carry this mantle in a moment when there is growing hostility in the so-called developed world to migrants, people of colour and the bodily autonomy of women and queer people.
I am unusual in another way. Unlike most people who do physics and astronomy research, I also have expertise in a discipline outside of the sciences. I am active in Black feminist science, technology and society studies, where I conduct research and develop explanations about how sex, race and class shape how science happens. This work formed part of my tenure dossier, though very much secondary to my research on dark matter and neutron stars. And it made my push for tenure more urgent given the current political conditions, with laws being passed across the US to prevent people from teaching about race, sexuality and gender in American classrooms, from kindergarten to university.
It is hard to focus on getting work done when daily news items suggest that what I do might be labelled 鈥渋llegal鈥� by people who clearly subscribe to a 鈥渇ree speech for me, not for thee鈥� philosophy. In the midst of all of this, it has been helpful to return to why the world of physics is interesting and this column has given me space to do that. I want to thank my audience for being on this journey with me, and next month I promise to be back with more to say about the sticky problem of 鈥�What is mass?鈥�
Chanda鈥檚 week
What I鈥檓 reading
An advance copy of astrobiologist Aomawa Shields鈥檚 Life on Other Planets: A memoir of finding my place in the universe.
What I鈥檓 watching
I finally got TikTok and have been watching a lot of very skilled satires of reality TV show Vanderpump Rules.
What I鈥檓 working on
I鈥檓 preparing to teach stellar astrophysics this fall!
