Required reading for geoscientists in the U.S. (and recommended reading for anyone who loves the outdoors) relevant to recent events: "Black Faces, White Spaces" by Dr. Carolyn Finney, about the relationships between Black Americans, the outdoors, and environmental organizations. 
The book discusses the history of Black relationships with the environment, the way that this history informs modern collective memory, Black representation in outdoors-focused media and organizations, and Black action for and exclusion from environmental causes.
One major point of the book is that many outdoors and environmental spaces have been and still are unfriendly and unsafe for Black people, as demonstrated by recent cases like Christian Cooper, leading to a disconnect in Black participation in and perception of the outdoors.
Books like this are vital reading for geoscientists (especially white geoscientists) b/c geoscience is one of the whitest STEM fields, but many of its real impacts (e.g. climate policy) have a history of disproportionately harming communities of color. nature.com/articles/s4156…
Geoscientists have a habit of portraying our entire field as a wild nature adventure. Field work is important to many (me included), but acting like that's the only way geoscience happens is misleading to everyone and hostile those who feel (justifiably) unsafe in outdoor spaces.
Geoscience (along with all STEM fields and academia in general) also has widespread and deep-seated problems with racism that damage recruitment, retention, and inclusion of Black scientists, which harms our science and our communities. nature.com/articles/s4156…
White geoscientists (like myself) have to educate ourselves from the existing literature (like this book) and from the experiences that Black people share, and use that information to be ACTIVELY anti-racist in our work and in our larger communities.
Let it be perfectly clear: in geoscience and everywhere, #BlackLivesMatter.
You can get Dr. Finney's book from Amazon here: amazon.com/Black-Faces-Wh…
Or from UNC Press here: uncpress.org/book/978146961…
And you can follow some stellar Black scientists (many of whom are doing awesome field work) from the @BlackAFinSTEM list here: twitter.com/i/lists/126615…
Or from UNC Press here: uncpress.org/book/978146961…
And you can follow some stellar Black scientists (many of whom are doing awesome field work) from the @BlackAFinSTEM list here: twitter.com/i/lists/126615…
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