The Quest for a Physics Identity
Felicia Strandberg Östman
Handledare: Anders Johansson och Staffan Andersson
Projekt i fysik och astronomi, 1FA195
Institutionen för fysik och astronomi
Projekt i fysik och astronomi, 15 hp Felicia Strandberg Östman, 2016-12-16
Introduktion
Denna rapport är en redovisning av ett projekt inom fysikens didaktik. Projektet har utförts med handledning av Staffan Andersson och Anders Johansson.
Som ämne för projektet valdes studier av diskussionerna kring identitet inom fysikkulturen. Projektet är sprungen ur en nyfikenhet om varför studenter väljer att studera fysik på universitetet samt i hur detta relaterar till deras självbild och världsbild. Diskussionen är speciellt relevant i frågor om avhopp och slutförande av fysikutbildningar, samt till frågor om mångfald i fysikkulturen. Projektet har dock fokuserat på mer generella frågor gällande attityder, normer och diskurser. Exempel på frågor som har varit intressanta att ställa är
● Hur ser studenter på varför de valt att studera fysik på universitetsnivå?
● Hur ser studenterna på sig själva som fysikstudenter och fysiker?
● Vad tycker studenterna krävs för att få bli kallad “fysiker”?
Mer specifika forskningsfrågor presenteras i dokumentet nedan.
Projektet har gjorts inom ramen av en kurs på 15 hp. Den första delen utgjordes av en litteraturstudie, för att läsa in mig på teori och metod som gjorts av andra på området, samt analys av befintlig data insamlad av Staffan Andersson och Anders Johansson. Detta innebar tolkning av skriftliga berättelser från fysikstudenter som berättar om sin väg till fysiken. Utifrån resultaten från denna analys, formulerade jag forskningsfrågor som utgjorde grunden för projektets nästa del. Resultaten presenterades i form av en poster samt en muntlig presentation vid TUK (16 mars 2016). Den andra delen utgjordes av mer litteraturstudier, i huvudsak för att få insikt i och kunna använda kvalitativ metod. Litteraturstudier gjordes även i relation till projektets nya forskningsfrågor. Tre studenter valdes ut för intervjuer som uppföljning. Intervjufrågor formades utefter forskningsfrågor och relaterade till de tre studenternas ursprungliga berättelser. Intervjuerna transkriberades och analyserades. Resultaten tolkades sedan i relation till projektets första del och redovisades i en muntlig presentation på ett seminarium (31 maj 2016).
Som skriftlig redovisning valdes ett artikelmanuskript i det skick som rymdes inom projektet. Den rapport som föreligger är ett arbetsdokument som fungerar som underlag för fortsatta diskussioner med medförfattare och kollegor. Bifogat i appendix finns även material som jag arbetat med under projektets gång men som ännu inte har satts in i artikelmanuset.
The Quest for a Physics Identity
Abstract
The question of the “physics identity” has recently begun to take a more central part in the discussion about the physics students. The discussion often revolves around what characteristics are important in order to be successful in one’s physics education, as well as in order to “become a physicist”. Questioning what this means is important for the discussion about diversity in physics as well as to the one about student integration and completion. Using narrative analysis, as inspired by Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen (2015), the identity construction of students in relation to physics is investigated. This paper contributes to the discussion about the physics identity and adds to it some important questions. The results show that finding a way of using physics as a part of their general identity construction as a person is more relevant to the students, than to find a “physics identity”.
Studying Identity in the Culture of Physics
There are many different ways in which we can speak about the physics community and the new students´interactions with it. The focus has been shifted towards an identity perspective, where to learn physics is to adopt a certain “physics identity”. The questions necessary to ask at this point is of course, what does it mean to acquire such a “physics identity”, and how does one go about to do it? This quest for the physics identity is hence something concerning not only the students’ themselves, aspiring to be successful in their studies and future careers, but it is also one for the researchers, trying to figure out the meaning of the concept.
Anders Johansson (2016) gives a summary of the discussion, and writes “Becoming a physicist does not only concern ‘learning to think like a physicist’ [2], this strand of research argues, but also to act and talk like a physicist, and see oneself and be seen as a ‘physics person’.” Johansson criticizes the lack of perspectives focusing on the meaning of “becoming a physicist”. Arguing for the benefits of drawing upon theories from the social sciences, Johansson suggests using a poststructuralist notion of discourse, in the tradition of Michael Foucault, since this would allow for a deeper analysis of the concept of a physics identity.
Johansson argues that this perspective enables focus on the power structures within a culture , thus highlighting the importance of not taking norms for granted, especially when working towards an increased diversity in the student body.
Reproduction of Physics Values
Cathrine Hasse (2008) illustrates the benefits of talking about the physics community as a
“community of practice”, in the way defined by Lave & Wenger. She connects this to the
“professional identity”
of physicists, which consist to the largest part of the “scientific mind”. In
her work, Hasse shows how newcomers of the field of physics learn to accentuate certain stories about their childhood, in which they are perceived as having the right kind of “scientific mind”. This is crucial in order to be able to “think as a physicist” because included in this scientific mind, she explains, is a critical and questioning view of the world. According to her, this is also related to play and playfulness, which she argues is often highly valued within physics. Hasse explains how the interactions between the “newcomers” and the “oldtimers”
serve as a reproduction mechanism. The oldtimers recognize what they think is appropriate characteristics, such as playfulness, in newcomers. At the same time, the newcomers will learn to highlight the characteristics they learn are valuable.
Also concerning how newcomers navigate the rules of the culture of physics, Sharon Traweek (1988) makes an extensive study of the world of high energy physicists. Traweek gives an explanation on how values are passed on to undergraduates students through for example course books, stories about heroic physicists as well as interactions with older physicists, such as supervisors. In this she is thus addressing reproduction of the culture of physics.
Johansson et.al. (2016) argues that the discursive practices of undergraduate courses may be seen as a reproduction of certain aspects of physics culture. In the same way, this study will view the discourse practiced by the students as possible reproductions of culturally shared values och norms within the programme culture and perhaps even the entire physics culture.
This study will thus view the students as reflecting certain norms of the physics culture.
Attractiveness of Physics
Henriette Tolstrup Holmegaard, Lene Møller Madsen and Lars Ulriksen (2014) study danish students’ transition to science and technology in higher education. Central in their findings is students’ strategies for overcoming the common experienced gap between the expectation and the experience of their study programme. They build on the integration theory of Vincent Tinto (1993), translating his concepts into terms of strategies and belonging as well as combining it with the concepts of identities and negotiations. In their framework, identity is seen as “always in transition” (p.759) and as an ongoing process of “meaning making” and “negotiation”. According to Holmegaard et al. (2014), students’ main priority is finding an education that will give them an
“attractive identity”, rather than choosing a subject they have a direct interest in.
Staffan Andersson and Anders Johansson (2016) talk about identity in terms of discourse positions and recognition. They show how the identity construction is carried out in relation to other people, whom the student want or does not want to “be seen as”.
Interested in looking at the students’ identity construction, this study investigates the process of students building their choice-narratives about why they decided to study physics in higher education. This will explore the relationship between identity construction and views of
physics. Taking a student-centered perspective, this paper thus attempts to contribute to the discussion about what it means to “become a physicist” by first asking another question - what does “physics” really mean to the students? This paper thus investigates what meaning the students ascribe to their choice of study programme and direction within the programme. It also explores the meaning ascribed to the process of themselves becoming physicists, and more generally what it means to become and to be a physicist.
Extending even further on the arguments of Johansson, about the importance of looking at the meaning behind the physics identity, it would be fruitful to question if the students really view the concept in the same way as the researchers trying to define it. Continuing on Johansson’s fully student-centered picture, it is important to ask ourselves what the students think of the matter. Are the students themselves aware of this concept of the physics identity?
Do they have an idea of what it might entail? Do all students even want one? And if they do, how consciously are they working towards one? We must also ask ourselves some more basic questions about the assumtions of which we build our discussions. Is the concept of a physics identity really the best way to address the bigger picture? Perhaps the implications of the physics identity are leading us astray? Talking about a physics identity might have implications in how we interpret the subject that are in fact just assumptions. This question opens up for alternative ways of viewing and understanding.
This paper thus draws upon the discussion about the physics identity and adds to it some new questions. Is a physics identity really is something that all students necessarily wants? And if they do - why do they want it? This paper will explore this by first asking what meaning the students ascribe to physics itself. This meaning making will be investigated further by exploring questions such as how this meaning making of physics is carried out and relate to their process of “becoming a physicist”. This paper will also continue this analysis down to the subfields of physics and see how different kinds of physics are ascribed different meanings. We will look at how students relate themselves to other people in the different social contexts they are surrounded by - and what it means to “become a physicist” and “to be a physicist” in these different contexts.
Analysing Construction of Narratives
This study draws upon traditions of narrative analysis in order to investigate the patterns in students identifying themselves as physicists, and what social meaning these might have.
Michael Bamberg (2012) describe how narrative perspectives are useful in studying how individuals position themselves along “culturally shared values” when forming their sense of selves. They describe identity as navigated in three dimensions. The first dimension implies that the narratives must manage the balance between the two extremes of “constancy and change across time”. In the second dimension, the authors use the terms “sameness and difference” in order to explain how the identity navigation is concerned with positioning the subject in relation to other people. Narratives thus become engaged in expressing both “individual identities and group belongings” (p.104). These concept of sameness and difference will be of great benefit in the current paper. The third dimension is that of “agency”. In what he calls the “agency
dilemma”, Bamberg divides the subjects into two groups depending on how the subject-world-interaction is built in the narrative. One group positions themselves according to a
“person-to-world” style of building, while the other group use a “world-to-person” direction.
The procedure of using narrative analysis combined with an identity perspective have been exercised by many other researchers studying the culture of physics as well. In similarity to Bamberg, Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen (2015), present the benefits of applying this theory within higher education research. They show how narrative theory allows us to understand how students ascribe meaning to their choices of higher education studies.
Important in our study, is the focus on the interactions of the individual with surrounding social groups and its´cultures, as well as how the individual is recognised within these. In the framework of Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen as well as in that of Holstein and Gubrium, meaning making is understood as “culturally embedded” . As such, it is also negotiated between the individual’s sense of self and that of the individual’s surroundings. The culturally shared values serves as the maze in which the individuals must orient their narratives and identity constructions. This process can be described in two ways. First, is the importance of coherence in time. Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen (2014), in agreement with Holstein and Gubrium (2012), describes how the students engage in making their stories coherent and what
“negotiation strategies” are used in order to achieve this, even when great changes in the narratives has been made from one time to another. Second, Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen shows how the choice of study also have to be recognized as “proper and suitable” by the individuals surrounding social sphere and is thus continuously negotiated in relation to these people. However, while negotiating their choices with their surrounding, the subject must remain a certain amount consistency while at the same time engage in enough change, in order for negotiation to be possible. Included in the “proper and suitable” criteria exists an authenticity aspect as well. Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen (2015) describes how a “proper choice”
should not, according to culturally shared values, be made under too much influence of other people. Therefore the individual must construct a choice narrative which is both recognized by their surroundings and in alignment with their own perceived identity. Thus, an important consideration is the balancing act between the importance of consistency and the importance of a proper choice. The individual must combine their own self image, the views of their surroundings and the expectations on the programme as well as the future identity which the studies are supposed to give. This is not an uncomplicated task. To accomplish this, negotiation of the narrative is made which sometimes results in necessary retrospective changes of the narratives - to adjust for new meanings - when new experiences arises.
As an analytical tool, Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen (2014) use the concept of
“turning points”. They explain turning points as a narrative tool that students use in order to mark important events that was followed by a “change in perspective in terms of their considerations of the past and their expectations of the future” (p.766). This connects to how they describe students’ use of negotiation strategies in order to bridge the gap between expectations and experiences as well as how the achievement of a sense of “belonging” to the study programme becomes important.
Stories of Students
This study explores questions related to the physics identity of students. The project began by wondering how students view the reasons for wanting to study physics. Therefore, first year students were asked to tell the story of their journey to physics. In order to investigate how more experienced students view the same question, and perhaps even how it has changed during some time within the community of physics, three follow up case studies were conducted.
Approaching Physics
After having studied for only a couple of weeks, students in the bachelor programme in physics at Uppsala University were asked to write a letter sharing their life stories, in relation to physics, up to this point. When entering this new chapter of their lives, what had brought them there?
This request was repeated to the next cohort of students enrolled in the programme and in total 35 students chose to participate. The gender distribution, assumed on the basis of first name, were 14 female students and 20 male students. As thanks for participating in the study, the students received a backpack with a print that said “physics”, in Swedish, and had the university logo on it. Preliminary results guided the design of the next part of the study.
Journey through Physics
Later, three follow up case studies were conducted. These consisted of semi-structured interviews with three students who were still active on the program one and a half or two and a half years after the initial narratives had been written. During the time of the follow up interviews, all 14 of the female students remained on the programme, while the corresponding number for the male students was 12. Three students were chosen for follow up interviews, each representing a theme found in the written letters. A interview were divided into three parts. The first part asked the same question as the one the students had answered in the initial stories. In the second part, the students were asked questions relating to their life in Uppsala and relationships with family, teachers, other students as well as questions about their choice of study. Questions about what family and friends thought about their study choice were also included. The third part included questions about similarities and discrepancies between the initial and the follow up narrative, as well as a dialogue about reflections.
Interpreting Stories
Their letters were interpreted with narrative analysis, especially searching for turning points as described by Holmegaard, Madsen and Ulriksen (2014). The follow up interviews were interpreted and analyzed in relation to the initial narratives. Both narrative analysis and discourse analysis were used to produce the results that are presented in this paper. The
interviews were conducted and interpreted in Swedish. The translation of quotes used for illustration has been made afterwards.
Telling Identities
Recurring themes were identified in the analysis. The three major themes will be presented through representative narratives and quotes from students, whose names and too personal information have been changed in the presentation, for the sake of anonymity.
Two of the themes share important similarities to the result of Hasse (2008), and will be discussed in relation to her study. The third theme will receive more extensive attention, as it is a theme which we have not clearly found described elsewhere in literature. The first theme will be illustrated by extracts from the narratives of Maria, who represents the tendency to use references to family members and family activities to build one’s narrative. This theme share great similarities to Hasse’s (2008) group of “childhood physicists”, in which “parental influence”
are credited as important.
The second theme is characterised by references to earlier school experiences, and will be represented here by Jenny. These students often use references to accomplishments in earlier school years, fellow students and teachers who have inspired, or challenged, them. This theme as well will be compared to the findings of Hasse (2008), in which she explains how students commonly use references to teachers in high school.
The third theme is a tendency to build one’s narrative by stressing the lack of belonging experienced by the storyteller. They commonly construct narratives that make them out to look like the outcast, or the underdogs. Among these students, physics is constructed as something that will give them belonging. This theme will be represented by extracts from the written narratives of Sara, Martin and Karl, as well as from the interview with Sara.
Physics as a Family Activity
Several students state that it is because of parents that physics appeared to them as an alternative. Some students describe slow processes where the parents have been continuously supporting and encouraging their physics interests. Other students have described how it was through activities shared with their family they experienced the moments where they all of a sudden just knew that physics was something they wanted to continue with, in theory described as a turning point of the narrative.
Maria knew she wanted to do physics long before she even knew what the word physics actually meant. Growing up, she was known by her family as “the little professor”. She was given this nickname because as a child, she always had her head in the clouds and was often forgetting things. The use of her childhood nickname as a narrative resource is an interesting starting point in our analysis. It is a resource giving credibility to her choice narrative. It works as an argument for supporting her choice and gives her story a sense of continuity. Becoming a physicist is not something she woke up and simply decided one day. She has been fit to be a physicist long before she even knew what it meant. As we will see later in this paper, being a
physicist she believes “has much more to do with what kind of person, what mindset you have”.
In that respect, she paints the picture of always having been the right kind of person to pursue the physics title. She has belonged to academia long before she entered the buildings of the university. This relates directly to the results of Hasse (2008) and her discussion about the
“scientific mind” and “childhood physicists”.
In her narrative, Maria tells us about a particular conversation with her father. As a kid, he was the one who taught her everything she knows about the phenomena of physics. This particular day, she had learned about quantum physics and string theory in school and her father could no longer answer her questions. She explains
“... this was the first time I came home with a bunch of questions which my father could not answer. ‘I never got that far’, he said, ‘I have taught you everything I know about classical physics, now you will learn about modern physics and teach me’. I promised I would and in the same moment I got the feeling that I were throwing myself out into something unknown and exciting.”
- Maria, first year
Between the lines, we learn that she comes from a family where the father knows and values physics and she herself also states that her father has been a great inspiration to her. In other statements of Maria, it becomes apparent that the two of them have been socializing over physics at other situations as well. She writes about how her dad usually explained physical phenomena in playful ways. As an example, she gives the story of the time at breakfast when he used a carton of milk and a pack of cornflakes in order to explain the concept of density. An interesting thing is that when she is asked to explain her way to physics in her interview more than a year later, she tells the very same story of the breakfast physics anecdote in her narrative. Other students writes about their parents helping them out with school, sitting at the dinner table at home together working with physics problems. Others tells stories about stargazing with a parent or about family members giving them books on physics. One student describes how she and her father were out sailing, talking about the winds, and how she decided to become a meteorologist. One student tells us about a trip to CERN together with their father who were really interested in physics and had a friend working there. These results can as well be related to that of Hasse (2008), where play is to practice physics and often highly valued in the culture of physics.
Referencing to family is, as previously stated, very common in the students’
constructions of their choice-narratives. However, not all students used their families as narrative resources. In her first narrative, Jenny explains how her father is a physicist working at the very same university where she now study. However, she decidedly states that this fact definitely has nothing to do with her choice to study physics. In the follow up interview, when I ask about her family, it becomes clear that not only is her father a physicist but both her mother and older sister has at some point studied physics at university as well. Still, she does not uses this fact to build her narrative. To her, it seems more important to accentuate her independent choice. Thus showing that, even though her family clearly can be viewed as a real resource it doesn’t necessarily need to be used as a narrative resource.
Accomplishments in School
Instead of invoking her family, Jenny credits the support of her teacher as important to her when choosing physics. She builds her credibility by telling the reader of the multiple science competitions she entered and won when she was younger. She tells stories about winning both Swedish and a Scandinavian competition as well as going abroad to participate in a competition. In her letter she describes how she advanced to the final in a competition about a student project work, but that she got a fever and her parents forbade to go, which she describes as a huge disappointment. Over all, she builds the narrative of a quite competitive character. Since this competitive style of physics is extensively covered in the literature about the culture of physics, for example by Traweek (1988), I decide to ask her about it in our follow up interview.
“Yes, I think that I am pretty competitive when it comes to grades perhaps. Well, I don’t know if it counts as being competitive but… perhaps it’s towards myself, more than towards others. But since I haven’t gotten other grades than [top grade] so far, I feel that I could get [top grades] in all courses. So that’s my goal. So I guess that’s a competition. But I have started to let go of that characteristic since upper secondary school. I feel it is easier in some cases, but not all… I think it is easier to be in a community if one is not so competitive. Because if you are, it seems you get pretty lonely. So, yeah.”
- Jenny, second year
Even though the competitive style has been described as common among successful physicists, in this case we learn that it is not appreciated to be too competitive. She states, that she now believes that competitiveness equals loneliness and that she has been trying to tone down her own competitive traits. This can be discussed in relation to Traweek (1988), in particular the discussion about gender and competition, but also to the argument of national differences.
Even more common is the students who writes stories of their accomplishments in school or about the acknowledgement given by their teachers and fellow classmates in earlier school years. Jenny describes how she got to represent her class in math and physics competitions, another student tells us about how she always got to read out loud to the class because she was the best at reading. Many students writes about being the person who the other students would go to in order to ask questions. By using these stories as narrative resources, they effectively build a picture of themselves as recognized as smart enough to study physics. Other students describe the experience of not being that good of a student in earlier school years. Some of them even admit to often cutting class, and having to struggle in order to get through school. They describe the turning point of having a teacher that suddenly believed in them and were able to inspire them. For the first time they were recognized as having potential in school. Again, these results are interesting to discuss in relation to Hasse (2008) who describe the “doubter” that use school references as resources in their narratives.
The Rebellious Physicist
We will introduce the third major theme in how students use physics in building their narratives with the story about Sara. This will be a story of a very unrepresentative physics student. At least, this is the first thing she wants to make sure when we meet for our interview. She is then in her third year, just about to start her bachelor project.
However, we will start by analyzing her narrative from her first couple of weeks of studies at the physics programme at Uppsala University. In her letter, she writes about her earlier struggles to find a place to belong. She writes about distancing herself from others in her hometown, at the same time searching for some social community where she could fit in.
"When I was young I sought a force of resistance, a movement, an organisation where I could vent my youthful anger and frustration. But there was no working class movement, no patriotism, no religion for me to turn to. [...] I did not like the environment surrounding me, the town where I lived was a typical industry town where the worker did nothing else than to work.
The possibilities were few and even the local college was known for its specializations in profane industry jobs, that would give a 'secure future'. Words that I hated! Nothing is secure about the future, in the future we will all lay in our graves, and then it is highly insecure what will come to happen."
- Sara, first year
Failing to find a movement or organisation to vent her teenage anger, she decided to put all of her energy into the intellectual. She continues to distance herself from the people of her hometown and explains how she couldn’t stand the idea of staying in her industry hometown.
Yet, she started working as a factory worker. The big turning point in her narrative is the downsizing of the company where she was working, which resulted in half of the work force being dismissed. Now unemployed, she realised that she “had other plans than to be just another pawn in the game of the people upstairs and working only to be able to have a safe and boring future”. Maybe it is the same yearning to get away from her boring hometown, the place where she does not feel like she belongs, that is being reflected in the end of her letter. She writes:
"I even considered myself too important to have to care about being needed in an occupation.
And to step out of this frame there was only one simple thing you could do, and that’s research.
Research about space, because I want to break free from the world and repeal the laws of nature. I buckled up and said 'Fuckit, I'm a rebel, I’m gonna be an astronaut. And now here I am."
- Sara, first year
Physics in this narrative become a way to disidentify with the people in her home town. This part of her narrative should probably not be interpreted literally but as symbolic exaggerations with the aim of mediating the feelings that she sees as the reasons for her choice. I interpret "break
free from the world" as an expression of her urgent need to break free from her situation, where she feels trapped in a boring life with a boring future, in a boring town where she does not belong, with boring people she can’t relate to. Her frustration screams from behind the letters.
She’s a captive and physics is her liberation. It is her way to break free – from the boredom, from the frustration, the people, the town and perhaps even Earth and the entire world.
In their narratives, this group of students distance themselves from other people, especially from adults and grown ups but also from classmates or work colleagues. They say they do not care about other people, or that they do not want to be like the other people around them – yet somehow they still seem to be yearning for some kind of social context to belong in.
Another student, Martin, writes in his letter that he
“...has no friends and don’t care that much about friends and the social life. The only thing I want is for there to exist a memory of me before I die, therefore I decided early on to try to solve one of the big mysteries of the world… Physics is something I study and think about partly for myself, as well as for everyone else.”
- Martin, first year
Martin is also distancing himself from other people while at the same time using them as a reason to do physics, revealing that maybe he is not as unconcerned as he first says. He states that he does not care much about friends, while at the same time expressing a desire for people to remember him. To always exist in the history books of physics, perhaps thus guaranteeing his immortality. This is interpreted as guaranteeing that he will always be important to others.
“Physics” is not just physics for Martin. Physics is a way to be remembered by and be important to other people. It must be difficult to care so much for people while at the same time not believing it possible to befriend them and to crave their recognition but not feeling included by them. Maybe this is why he later in his letter writes
"However strange it may sound I think that I, in similarity to an ant is governed by its DNA and genes. Maybe they do not have that many feelings. So is the universe governed by a code, a code which determines a life, like the seasons of Earth. Where everything´s goal is to go through all seasons and, at some point, land where everything started. A kind of perpetual motion machine which can never be destroyed."
- Martin, first year
In this quote, it is unclear if Martin intends to compare himself to the universe. However, he uses the ants and the universe as narrative resources in order to make a point about how he feels about himself. Put together with the context of the letter as a whole, this is an important passage. In my interpretation, he might struggle in the interactions with other people but at least he is like the ants and the universe, and thus he is not alone. Being connected to the world, instead of to the people in it. At least, he is connected to something which is never ending, that goes on forever, never destroyed, always existing. Just like he himself would be if he managed to discover something big enough to put him in the history books. Perhaps this is the reason for his interest in discovering all the secrets of the universe. Physics plays the role of a way to be
remembered, to find a connection to other people. In this interpretation, Martin and Sara both ascribe meaning to physics as being what will bring them closer to other people. Physics is thus used as a narrative resource to build on their own identity as a person, the one they already held before choosing physics.
Karl explains the important philosophical epiphany of an existential nature that made him realise something that would change how he sees the world. He writes
“I was laying in bed in my room, which had blue wallpapers, throwing a tennis ball against the wall. My friends were probably in school, doing maths or physics or something else clever, boring and completely insignificant. As I were lying there, bored and disheartened by the futility of the world - because its futility were undeniable, something I in my uneducated, teenage superiority knew better than anyone else, especially adults - I suddenly became aware that I always managed to catch the tennis ball after it bounced off the wall.”
- Karl, first year
Karl describes his disappointment about the world and how he was distancing himself from other people, both adults as well as peers. This moment serves as a turning point in his narrative and is described as a beginning of a change in attitude as well as of the journey towards physics. He writes
“With time, and some research, I adapted a new view of physics. I realised that physics was the key to a deeper, more open and more rewarding view of the world. And this openness led to a change in my view of the world. All of a sudden, something had meaning. [...] I knew that there were something cutting through the grey meaninglessness of everyday life, something which I not yet had been able to shake. There were now something that made it worth to get out of bed.
Something magical, even though it was not the magic I first imagined”
- Karl, first year
In the context of his letter, we realise that Karl was not feeling his best at the time before this event. He describes the turning point as a major change in his view of the world and in his life.
To Karl, physics is what gives him meaning. A reason to get out of bed. Something saving him from the boredom and greyness. He puts it best himself; physics is “the key to a deeper, more open and more rewarding view of the universe”.
In this group of students that describe emotional struggles, rebellion, and the feeling of being an outcast, it is clear that physics is more than just physics. It is more than numbers and interpretations and universal laws. Among these students, physics is ascribed the meaning of liberation of boredom, connection to other people, a reason to get out of bed. Physics is to all of them the thing that will bring them to where they want to be. Perhaps physics is even seen as a place where they will belong, where they will find a community where they will fit in.
The students are building their choice narratives, in them constructing their identities to support their choice. They describe where they were before and where they want to be in the future. Physics is what fits the characteristics of taking them where they want to be, to who they want to be. They do not tell us that they really want to be physicists per se. They tell us that they
want a way to escape, something to be remembered for, a reason to get out of bed. From this perspective, the identity construction is less about becoming a physicist. It is more about becoming who they want to be, with physics being the bridge to travel to get to where the grass is greener.
Meanings of Physics
To further explore the ways of identity construction, this paper will analyze how students relate themselves to other people in the different social contexts they are surrounded by, as well as what it means to “become a physicist” and “to be a physicist” in these different contexts.
Different social groups have different discourses when it comes to the meanings of becoming or being a physicist. Being a physicist at a bar is not necessarily, as we will see, the same as being a physicist at university.
If acquiring a physics identity is essential, how does one know if one has reached the goal? Wondering what the students think about the matter, I ask them if they feel like physicists.
Somehow, it seems like a difficult question which they are quite careful to answer.
“Well, yes I think I do, I would probably say that I do. Then again, I'm very well aware of the fact that I'm a quite unexperienced physicist in relation to... well... scientists of different kinds and professors and such. One has to realise that, you know. But I would probably call myself a physicist if someone would ask. I think it has much more to do with what kind of person, what mindset you have than… well, knowledge is of course also important but if you are a physicist or not I think comes down to what approach you have as a person when you look at different problems and stuff. And in that respect, I would probably call myself a physicist. Yepp.”
- Maria, second year
“Yeah, I think I do. Yes, yes I do. I feel more like a physicist now than, yes, I feel a bit like a physicist. It feels like I’m beginning to get there. It is not really fully there, but it, I have a small perception of it. I think that, well of course, it is difficult to assign oneself the title of physicist the first year … but now it feels like I have something to hold onto. If someone would ask me at a bar today, then I would probably, with a clean conscience, say that I’m a physicist.”
- Sara, third year
Quickly stating that they of course do not have all the knowledge of researchers and professors or that they are not “really fully there yet”, it seems like they are not fully comfortable in claiming the physicist title and they do so only cautiously. In order to answer the question, they first reformulate it and thus shift focus to the fact that they are in the process of becoming a physicist or definitely have what it takes to become one, which enables them to answer the question with a yes. The students’ physics identities also seems to be situation dependent, perhaps adding to the difficulties in answering the question. I ask Sara what it takes in order to be able to be called a physicist.
“Well, you should have a physics degree I think. Or, we do tease the meteorologists and geophysicists, about them not being physicists. But I guess they are also physicists. To be a physicist I think you should have a masters degree… With a bachelor in physics you’re just in the process. Physicist in the making.”
- Sara, tredje året
Now, Sara states that one should have a masters degree in order to be a called a physicist and right now, in the end of her bachelor, she is just a “physicist in the making”. However only seconds ago, she stated that she would probably call herself a physicist at a bar and that she would do so “with a clean conscience”. Being a physicist thus seem to be a very relative question. At the bar, among non-physicists, the physics identity is quite easy to claim. However, compared to professors, teachers and others more established in the field, the student identity seems more appropriate to claim. Among the students, the physics identity doesn’t even seem like the most relevant identity to claim. If everyone is the same level physicist, the relevant question instead becomes what kind of physicist? Looking at Sara’s anecdote about the meteorologists and geophysicists from a discourse perspective, we can interpret the joke as reflecting a certain discourse in the culture of the programme. From this perspective, it becomes visible that the meteorology and geophysics identity is somehow in conflict with the physics identity. In comparison to other specialisations of the field, for example the astronomy identity which might be more compatible, being a meteorologist means being a little less of a physicist.
Also the physics identity seem to be divided into different categories depending on your subfield and if you want to be an experimental or a theoretical physicist. Looking into what the students say about these different categories, we can continue to look closer into what discourse can tell us about how this relative physics identity is constituted. When I ask Sara what subfield within physics she is interested in, she says
“I like this quantum information part actually. And also I am like… I don’t think that I want to like fight for PhD positions in string theory. I can leave that to those who are more prestigey or who likes that prestige.”
- Sara, third year
Sarah’s choice of words here may be seen as a hint. She does not want to “fight” for the PhD positions in string theory, and will leave it to the students “who like the prestige”. We thus learn that string theory in this discourse is seen as a competitive field, where you have to fight in order to get a PhD position. We also learn that there is something prestigious about doing string theory, more so than doing quantum information theory. Another quote from Sarah describes the same discourse that Johansson et al. (2016) writes about. She describes a study situation on an introductory quantum physics course similar to the ones studied by Johansson et al.
“I noticed, when I were taking my first quantum physics course, and we were calculating, someone said ‘Wow, think about how cool this is!’ and then someone said ‘Shut up and calculate!’ and so we just continued to calculate.”
- Sara, third year
To analyze this quote, it is interesting to compare it to the study of Johansson et. al (2016).
Their paper is referencing both the article ‘Shut up and Calculate’ by Kaiser (2014) as well as a discourse they found among students and teachers in similar quantum physics courses as Sara’s. Johansson et al. found that the dominant discourse on the course made available primarily one discourse position that could be taken in order to be recognized as a good student, namely the one of being good at calculating quantum physics. The shut up and calculate attitude does not only seem to be something that is present here as well, but it also seems to be a discourse that the students themselves might even be aware of.
When reflecting about the difference between her views now and her previous written narrative, Maria says
“I think that the biggest different if I had written this today is that I might have talked more about the value of cooperation in physics. While I there talk a lot about it being cool to explore, which I definitely still think, I might have expressed myself rather about it being exciting to contribute to science. I think that one as an outsider [of physics] have a rather established view of physicists sitting alone in a room writing papers in all directions, you know. Like it may have been before.
But nowadays people work more in groups and that was perhaps something I didn’t value that much at the time but have learned to understand and to appreciate more recently, no doubt.”
- Maria, second year
In the conversation with Maria, she talks about a close female friend of hers that she has gotten to know on the programme. They usually take the same courses, both when they are taking more than full time as well as when they are taking less than full time. They also have been doing course projects and summer projects together on experimental divisions. Maria has also mentioned that she first wanted to be theoretical physicist or a particle physicist. Now she seems to be less sure, and says that she want to try different things out first, but that particle physics at least seems very interesting. An interesting shift in between her first written narrative and her interview is this shift from emphasising the allure of exploring the world and discovering amazing things to the emphasis on the value of collaborations.
Maria describes how the old stereotype of the lonely physicist is not valid any longer, nowadays physicists work in groups. The view of physicists as lonely characters, is something that also Jenny addresses. When asked about her image of physicists, she starts with dividing the question into two parts. One about theoretical physicists and one about experimental physicists.
“I was visiting the division for theoretical physics one day and there was a very bad atmosphere there. Everyone seemed pretty depressed and no one smiled. So when it comes to those kinds of physicists I think that they are pretty introvert and do their own work and are very antisocial.
But they are very good to ask questions to if you have a problem. Other physicists, well the ones doing more applied physics, experiments and all, I think they are pretty happy and helpful and like what they do. That's quite important. Because it’s not that many physicists that chose
physics for the money or something. So the ones that do it, they really like their work. And that’s fun.“
- Jenny, second year
Her images of the theoreticians and the experimentalists thus seem to be quite different. Within the discourse in which they are created by Jenny, although the theoretical physicists have the most prestige, they are not that happy. If we summarize the analysis about the theoretical physicists, we have seen that they are constructed as antisocial, prestigious and not that happy.
We can compare our discussion to the ones about the hierarchy of science as well as the one about the lonely physics genius by Traweek (1988). Interestingly, when I then ask Jenny what she wants to do herself, her answer is, perhaps surprisingly, that she wants to continue into theoretical physics.
“Right now it’s unfortunately theoretical physics. But I was thinking that I will not be depressed but that’s the area which is the most interesting. [...] I’m not that good with experiments and that much empirical physics. I rather like to derive and understand the mathematics. And sure it’s interesting to see that it works in reality as well, but that feels kind of like a bonus in physics.
Like, real physics to me is to derive and have everything on paper and see if it works.”
- Jenny, second year
An interesting note to make is the fact that Maria’s description of how the established view of a physicist coincide quite well with the view Jenny still hold about the theoretical physicists. Jenny says that the theoretical physicists are “introverted” and “antisocial”. Maria talks about the stereotype of the physicist “sitting alone in a room”. Together with what Sarah says about the prestige, it becomes relevant to compare this to what Traweek says about “the size and seriousness scale”. Looking at the culture that the undergraduate students first encounters and are being formed in, she finds that the students are being taught that they should care less about things that are visible and emotionally engaging. They should instead now value the things that are “fundamental, where nature is no longer accessible to the naked eye”.
Is this why there lies so much prestige in doing string theory? Meteorology and geophysics could be argued to be the subjects closest to the understanding of “common people”, the easiest to “see” with the naked eye, the most “emotionally engaging” subjects.
Weather affects many different aspects of our daily life from how we dress to our activities. We see meteorologists on the morning news every day. We talk about it with our colleagues by the coffee machine. Common people have an emotional connection to meteorology. Albeit not as common part of everyday as meteorology, people also do have an emotional connection to geophysics. We can feel an earthquake. When a volcano erupts an entire city might be eradicated, at worst. Our flight abroad might be cancelled, at best. Theoretical physics however, is not a part of people’s everyday lives. These observation raises the question why the physics closest to common people’s understanding - for example the weather and Earth - almost does
not qualify to be “real physics”? If we connect this discussion to another quote by Sara we can raise even more very interesting questions.
“Have you ever experienced meeting people after you started studying physics who would compliment you for being so darn smart? I think that is a bit uncomfortable when people are like
‘you are so smart’ and you’re like… well… not really… you know.”
- Sara, third year
In this quote, Sara explains her uneasiness about having people compliment her on her brains based solely on the fact that she’s studying physics. If we look at this statement from a discourse analytical point of view, we can extract that physics is seen as something difficult. You have to be really smart to do it. Perhaps, here we can find the essence of the question of the prestige of the theoretical physicist. This relates directly to the discussion about the elitist physics culture and physics education as described by Johansson et al. (2016). This also leads us to ask the question if the stereotype about the physicist is based on the theoretical physicist.
This results show that students already have perceptions about what it is like to “be a physicist” before they enter university education. Some of these perceptions have in this study been shown to be adjusted for during physics studies, however mostly concurring with the students experience on the programme. Therefore, we have to ask if it is perhaps not all about finding one’s physics identity but rather about finding a way to incorporate physics into the identity of the person. This may seem like an subtle and unimportant difference, however this subtle difference have important implications when it comes to the question about increasing the diversity of the student body as well as in the physics community as a whole. This articles thus is a voice in the calls for less intrusive claims of the students’ identities, and argues that this is an important requirement for a more fruitful discussion about both integration and diversity in the culture of physics.
Conclusions
The student’s choice is not only a choice about what to study, but also about who to become. In this process, physics is given the role of being what will bring the student to the place where they are supposed to be. In doing this, the students ascribe meaning not only to their choices that brought them to the physics programme, but also to physics itself. To these students, physics is more than just physics. Their narratives testifies to highly personal processes of meaning making of physics itself, where the word physics can symbolize liberation, affirmation, challenge, rebirth and belonging.
This paper also dives deeper into looking at how the feelings of sameness or difference with other physicists and different kinds of physicists, plays a role in deciding if physics is what can take you to your desired identity or not. Our results show that taking the meteorologist position increases the difficulties to be recognized as “being a physicist”. This can serve example of the problematic view of assuming the importance of “becoming a physicist” or finding a “physics identity”. Constructing a physics identity seem to be a process of sameness
and difference that is done both in relation to other physics people as well as to “common people”. Based on this insight, this article argues for a widening of the discussion of identities of physics. Our results show that “being a physicist” is a less relevant topic inside the physics community. Instead it becomes a question about what kind of physicist to be. It is clear that one kind of physics can construct sameness, while another can serve to construct difference. It is also clear that “physicist” is defined differently depending on who you are talking to. Being a physicist at a bar is not necessarily the same as being a physicist at university. These conclusions calls on a shift in focus, from if the students’ manages to find a physics identity, to if the student manage to find a way to use physics as a part of their general identity construction as a person.
References
Andersson, S., and Johansson, A. (2016). Gender gap or program gap? Students' negotiations of
study practice in a course in electromagnetism. Phys Rev Phys Educ Res,
12 (2).
doi: 10.1103/PhysRevPhysEducRes.12.020112
Bamberg, M. (2012). Narrative Practice and Identity Navigation. In Holstein, A. J., and Gubrium, F. J. Varieties of Narrative Analysis
. SAGE publications
Hasse, C. (2008). Learning and transition in a culture of playful physicists. European Journal of Psychology of Education.
doi: 10.1007/BF03172742
Hasse, C. (2014). The material co-construction of hard science fiction and physics. Cult Stud of Sci Edu.
doi: 10.1007/s11422-013-9547-y
Kaiser, D. (2014). History: Shut up and calculate! Nature, 505(7482),
153-155.
Johansson, A. (2016). Analyzing discourse and identity in physics education: Methodological considerations. Paper accepted to proceedings from the 2016 Physics Education Research Conference
Tinto, V. (1993). Leaving college. Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition
(2nd ed.).
Chicago, London: The University of Chicago Press.
Traweek, S. (1988). Beamtimes and lifetimes : the world of high energy physicists.
Harvard
University Press.
Holmegaard, H.T., Madsen, L.M., Ulriksen, L. (2014). A journey of negotiation and belonging:
understanding students' transitions to science and engineering in higher education. Cult Stud of Sci Edu.
9:755–786 doi: 10.1007/s11422-013-9542-3
Holmegaard, H.T., Madsen, L.M., Ulriksen, L. (2015). A narrative approach to understand students’ identities and choices
in Understanding Student Participation and Choice in
Science and Technology Education.
Appendix: Continuing the Work
I detta appendix följer en kort redovisning av material jag arbetat med under projektets gång som behöver ytterligare bearbetning innan det kan inkluderas i artikelmanuset, samt tankar och ideer som kan vara intressanta att fortsätta med.
Extending Theory and Methodology
Concerning the concepts of “belonging” and “recognition”, an extension of theory would serve to help the discussion further. Carlone & Johnson (2007) could perhaps be referenced here.
The concept of “Purity” related to the sciences, would be of interest in the discussion about the different subfields of physics. Becher & Trowler is a possible candidate of referencing.
Observation related to this subject:
This reminds me of an xkcd comic strip that I myself first encountered, in the welcoming material from the older students of the programme responsible for welcoming the new students, when starting my studies on this programme. In the comic strip, which can serve as a good visualization of the hierarchy of science discourse, six scientists are standing on a line - a sociologist, a psychologist, a biologist, a chemist, a physicist and a mathematician. The psychologist says ‘Sociology is just applied psychology’. The biologist says ‘Psychology is just applied biology’. The chemist of course then says that ‘biology is just applied chemistry. The physicist filles in ‘which is just applied physics. It’s nice to be on top.’ The mathematician is standing to the furthest right and says ‘Oh, hey, didn’t see you guys all the way over there’. At the top of the picture, the title reads ‘Fields arranged by purity’ with an arrow pointing towards mathematics as the most pure.
Utöver detta har jag även fokuserat på diskussion om vilken metod / framework is really the best way to frame these questions. And what implications the choice of framework has on the interpretations.
Both Hasse and Holmegaard, Madsen & Ulriksen refer to Jerome Bruner while building their framework.
Similarly to the study of Andersson and Johansson (2016), this study shows that students often use identification and disidentification as resources in constructing their choice-narratives and building their identities. An extension of theory regarding this identification and disidentification is of interest.
Bourdieu’s Concept of Capital
Ett annat perspektiv som skulle kunna användas är den Bourdieuianska traditionen. En rätt lång och populär tradition från sociologin. Kolla på möjligheterna låna in den?
Mycket av det Hasse säger stämmer in i Bourdieus teori. Hans begrepp fält skulle motsvara the physics community (eller communitites of practice såsom Hasse använder det), identity skulle ersättas med habitus
, och resurs med kapital.
Enligt Bourdieu är individen utrustad med ett habitus. Att veta hur en bör bete sig i ett visst socialt sammanhang är alltså att besitta rätt habitus för sammanhanget. Vad är kapital? Så fort något tilldelas värde inom det sociala fältet så betraktas det som ett kapital inom detta fält.
Referenser kan exempelvis göras till boken “Kultursociologiska texter” (1993) av Donald Broady och Mikael Palme, som ger ett urval Bourdieus texter samt en sammanfattning av hans teori.
Detta argumenteras även av Archer (2012), som även har introducerat begreppet “science capital”, alltså “vetenskapligt kapital”. En utökad undersökning av detta vore intressant.
Rebelliousness
The discussion about the rebelliousness as a characteristic common in the physics culture are to be extended, by further relating it to discussions of Traweek (1988) and Hasse (2008).
While this particular picture of the rebellious physicist is largely absent from the literature, the view of the physicist as a rebel or an underdog is not uncommon in the discourses of the culture and it all feels intuitively familiar. Jokes and pictures of for example Einstein performing perhaps one of the easiest and to common people known rebellious act, sticking his tongue out – like a kid defying his parents at bedtime – are prevalent in X. The feeling of being the black sheep is not unusual in the narratives either, and perhaps it can be connected to a discourse within the culture of physics that points to the proposed uniqueness of the physicist, viewed in a quote of Bernard Baruch pasted on office doors, t-shirts and probably coffee mugs - “Millions saw the apple fall, but only Newton asked why”.
It is interesting to draw parallels to famous physicists such as Einstein and Feynman. We have learned that physicists are lonely, just as Einstein were when he according to the stories were sitting alone at the patent office thinking about physics. We have seen how the rebellious style of Einstein and Feynman are being reflected in the narratives of the physics students. We have learned that just as Einstein is said to not have been popular in the eyes of the teachers, so has some of the students been far away from being star students in earlier school.
The following is a paragraph about Sara.
I wonder if it is among physicists she hopes to find her belonging. When I am about to meet her
for our follow-up interview, I wonder if she will have found her belonging here with physicists in Uppsala. I wonder if she will still be the same or if she will have changed. In her narrative, she’s a rebel. She even explicitly says so herself in the very end of her letter. The first thing she does after I have started the recording in the follow up interview is to express her feeling of not being very representative for the usual student body. She is right. Her letter is very unrepresentative for the majority of the narratives I have analyzed. However, it is this very way of portraying herself as unrepresentative that I am interested in because, actually, it’s this feature she shares with a group of other students in the study. This exact feature is why I chose her for my case study. She is the one that best represents the unrepresentative students, the rebel of all rebels.
I do not tell her this. Instead I tell her that it’s great that she’s not representative. Since I suspect her statement is meant to express her worry of being unfit in this study as well, I explain that I do not necessarily want students that are representative for the majority but want everyone to be represented. Maybe I just don’t have the courage to question her rebelliousness
Genus
% Gonsalves? Och Danielsson
The concepts of belonging and recognition are used by other researchers as well, and especially by those who view the process of “becoming a physicist” in relation to gender. In this study, these concepts are important as we problematize the individual's implied autonomy and self awareness regarding their own identity work and recognition. This discussion would be interesting to continue. Relevant references are Gonsalves and Danielsson.
Comments on the mentor
This results invites an increasing focus on the importance of role models. Hasse (2008) and Traweek (1988) can be used as references in a discussion addressing this. A further search of literature regarding role models and mentors could be fruitful. Relevant to discuss are the gendered connotations in the interactions of the mentor and the student. Hasse (2008) hypothesises the difference in how girls and boys are encouraged to play
A further discussion about how role models can be both a narrative resource as well as a real resource. In the case of Jenny, we saw how although she had a father in physics, and mother and sister who had studied physics at university, she did not want to credit them as reasons why choosing physics. Further comparison can be made to the narrative of Sara, who in the interview credits the support of a math teacher that encouraged her, while in her written narrative did not mention him at al. This is also interesting to discuss in relation to “science capital”.
Extending Discussions
About Maria. “This relates directly to the results of Hasse (2008) and her discussion about the
“scientific mind”. Denna diskussion kan utökas i relation till vad som innefattar denna “scientific mind”. Diskussionen kan också fortsättas i relation till rollen hos föräldern samt angående genus när det gäller vilken förälder som inspirerat fysik till dotter eller son samt Hasses kommentar om könad lek.
Alternativt perspektiv:
Att studenterna berättar fram sin plats, sin tillhörighet, sitt hemmahörande, i narrativen. Mer fokus på gruppinteraktion än individbegreppet. Hur jobbar fysikstudenter för att känna sig hemma? (kämpande för erkännande) Hur konstruerar de sig som hemmahörande i en viss kontext. Vilken roll spelar fysik i deras identitetskonstruktion / tillhörighetskonstruktion? Hur används fysiken som narrativ resurs i konstruerandet av en önskvärd identitet / önskvärt medlemskap eller belonging? Hur navigerar de fysikens struktur? Poststrukturalism.
Maktstruktur. Viktigt att se normerna. Dominerande diskurs. Hur konstrueras studenternas
“hemmahörande” i fysiken? Mer om relationer, mindre om ensam identitet. Även när vi snackar om negotiation så känns det som att den delen underskattas och att individens autonomitet och självkännedom och kännedom om normerna och strategier (som låter som att någon arbetar väldigt aktivt mot ett bestämt mål, har en plan och vet hur den ska utföras). Medlemskapspriset är att följa reglerna. → Studenterna ändrar sig efter normerna → Holmegaard et. al.
