I discovered Chanda Prescod-Weinstein via an article referenced in a Tatiana Mac talk (which also formed the basis of an article I wrote about being black in digital marketing).
Entitled ‘Diversity is a Dangerous Set-up‘, Chanda reviewed a book called ‘Race on the Brain: What Implicit Bias Gets Wrong About the Struggle for Racial Justice‘ by Jonathan Kahn and, to cut this short, said:
Trying to use science to analyze and fix racism is a dangerous proposition […] A focus on implicit bias at the expense of an attention to both explicit bias and the impact of bias may in fact be harmful to the fight for equality.
It’s a long piece but you must read it.
But back to the point of this article. Chanda is a theoretical cosmologist, an Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy and the University of New Hampshire and a Core Faculty Member in Women’s and Gender Studies. And she’s awesome.
In 2019, she spoke with Nam Kiwanuka about her origins in theoretical physics, why she was drawn to cosmology, the ways women in STEM were marginalised and her experiences as a queer Black woman within that.
Stream it below.
See also: 7 Blerds from history, the digital lives of Black women in Britain, and Georgina Baker: a Black female engineer making history.
Filed under: Black women Chanda Prescod-Weinstein LGBTQ+ misogynoir racism theoretical physics women