Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein Wants to Liberate Scientific Storytelling

Previously in my craft conversation series: Bryan Washington, Lydia Kiesling, R. O. Kwon and Crystal Hana Kim

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No writer has encouraged me to think more deeply about the universe we inhabit—and how we tell its stories—than Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein. An assistant professor of physics and astronomy and core faculty in women’s and gender studies at the University of New Hampshire, her research in theoretical physics is focused on cosmology, neutron stars, and dark matter; she is also a feminist theorist who researches Black feminist science and technology studies. I began following her writing nearly a decade ago, and since then have had the good fortune to edit and publish two of her many articles. Her book, The Disordered Cosmos: A Journey into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred—out in paperback on May 10—is a gripping work of science and art that manages to be both clarifying and wildly imaginative (not to mention accessible to nonscientists like me), a testament to her commitment to sharing knowledge and her belief that the work of questioning and understanding the cosmos should belong to everyone.

At its heart, Prescod-Weinstein told me, The Disordered Cosmos is “my proposal for how we can think about science outside of the military-industrial complex, outside of colonialism, how we can liberate this piece of our human storytelling impulse so that we can hold on to it.” Last month we chatted over Zoom about the elements of successful scientific storytelling, how writing was “a hard-fought process” for her, what she believes academics should know when publishing for nonacademic audiences, and why she works so hard to convince everyone—especially Black people and other people of color—that science is for them, too.

What came first, your love of science or your love