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Abstract How individuals come to perceive themselves in STEM is predicated on their understanding of what it means to be a member of the STEM community. This association is consequential when considering the perpetuation of white male ownership of STEM knowledge and power that forces learners identifying with groups systemically marginalized by racial and gender discrimination to adopt particular norms, values, and behaviors to gain recognition. In effect, these expectations help to maintain masculinized Discourses as STEM professionals are encultured to apply the same recognition criteria to which they were judged themselves. We examine how these Discourses are maintained even as learners who identify with groups that carry histories of systemic marginalization by racist, sexist, and elitist practices gain access to STEM communities. Specifically, we explore how university STEM students attending a Hispanic Serving Institution in the United States articulate gendered expectations of STEM membership through their characterization of themselves and others as (not) STEM people. Drawing from theories in Discourse, social identity, and feminist critiques of science, we describe how students implicitly recognize STEM identity in gendered ways. We discuss how our findings illuminate the mechanisms by which STEM recognition is afforded by pointing to its dependence on masculinized displays of STEM performances, competence, and interests, leading to a cycle of marginalization as learners are encultured to perpetuate existing STEM Discourses in their recognition of others. We discuss research implications for measurements of STEM identity that do not account for gendered Discourses and offer practical implications for the design of learning experiences that co‐opt existing Discourses to inoculate gendered perceptions of a STEM person prototype. Lastly, we present a case for elevating the role of maternal caregivers and family immigration histories in STEM identity construction.
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Constructing STEM identity: An expanded structural model for STEM identity research
An individual's sense of themselves as a “STEM person” is largely formed through recognition feedback. Un- fortunately, for many minoritized individuals who engage in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathe- matics) in formal and informal spaces, this recognition often adheres to long!standing exclusionary expectations of what STEM participation entails and institutionalized stereotypes of what it means to be a STEM person. However, caregivers, who necessarily share cultural backgrounds, norms, and values with their children, can play an important role in recognizing their children's in- terest and inclination towards STEM in ways that support children's authoring of their STEM identity in the face of these marginalizing discourses. To explore this idea, we conducted phenomenological interviews with STEM stu- dents attending a Hispanic!serving university, examining the nature of STEM!related conversations these students had with their parents during childhood. Participant re- collections provide evidence of conversational content, contexts, and structures that supported their identifica- tion with STEM even when faced with marginalizing ex- periences. We found that though this phenomenon was recounted across parent profiles, participant narratives also reflected differences in conversation content, con- text, and structure based on factors associated with STEM stereotypes, including gender, formal education or training in STEM, and parents' immigration experiences. Viewed within larger sociocultural discourses of whose knowledge “counts” in STEM, our work suggests the need for edu- cational institutions to acknowledge and embrace families' ability to foster youths' affinity with STEM contexts, while also recognizing and responding to institutionalized im- pediments to authentic STEM participation.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1846167
- PAR ID:
- 10309067
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Journal of Research in Science Teaching
- ISSN:
- 0022-4308
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1002/tea.21734
