Season 2: Episode 8: Creativity

Please tune in as I highlight a new book that I am reading, The Disordered Cosmos by Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, Ph.D.

Episode Transcript

Darline Berrios (00:03):
Hey everyone, welcome to Share Your Sparkle.
I'm your host, Dr. DarlineBerrios. And this is season two,
creativity. Hey, people, I hopeyou're well. I'm recording from
outside cuz it's prettydelicious here today. At some
point, you hear me yell at me.
And it's because we're sittingon the deck, and I'm hoping he

(00:23):
doesn't run away or starteddigging in the grass or the
sand, which is very possible,but I'll keep it in there
because it's probably reallyfunny. Um, I'm going to start
off by sharing a few resources,random memory, and then get
right into the topic of the daycreativity. But one resource I
want to share first is thatAlicia Keys and Deepak Chopra

(00:45):
are doing a 21 day meditation. Isaw that in my email today, I
don't know why I didn't see itlike about a week ago when I
think it started. And usually,like, I've done these with like
Oprah and him in the past, like,just they post like a message of
the day. And then like somespace and time with music, and a

(01:10):
mantra for you to repeat in. SoAlicia Keys is doing one with
him, which I think is reallygreat. So I recommend checking
that out. I just started day onetoday. And it talked about like,
the feminine, divine part of us,which is in everybody, you know,
like feminine and masculine. ButI think what they're trying to

(01:33):
do is highlight feminine energy,you know, bring more balance
into the world. So that's onething. The other is actually,
Elizabeth Gilbert. She's the onewho wrote Eat, Pray Love. She
wrote this book called BigMagic, which has to do with

(01:54):
creativity. And I recommend youcheck it out. It's a quick read.
Bane, sorry. Oh, my God, he'strying to help my dad fix the
car. And my dad's like, ifyou're not a mechanic, get out
of here. Anyway, Elizabeth,Gilbert, Big Magic. She writes
about creativity and how youdon't have to be a tortured

(02:18):
individual to be creative. Andshe shares some stories. And
it's a quick read, and I enjoyedreading it, and I've really read
it. So that's another resource.
And then the random memory forsome reason. There's a song and

(02:38):
it's kind of technically Ithink, oh, the guy's name is
Robert miles. And I think it'sdreamland. And I'm going back to
1996. This is when I remember itfor me. song is called one on
one. So 1996 that summer, Ilived in Florida, and I had a
little blue Celica was standard.
And I just remember it, likeplaying the CD and like being in

(03:02):
the summer sun and Florida andjust driving in my little blue
Celica down the highway. Andthat was just the most random
memory but one in one. Robertmiles. It's better no a 1990
song, I guess. I don't even knowhow big it wasn't where I heard

(03:24):
it. But that's my random memory.
And I'm wondering why that cameto mind. But oh, so I want to
share some words I started offlate. But I want to share some
words from a book that I haven'tfinished reading yet. But it's

(03:45):
called the disordered cosmos. Ajourney into dark matter, space,
time and dreams deferred byShonda prescod. Weinstein. And I
don't know how many of you knowthis about me like those of you
listening, who are my friends orfamily, but I love the night
sky. Like I have been fascinatedwith the stars since I was

(04:07):
little. And I don't think it'ssomething I share very often.
But like, this summer, I mightget like a telescope. And
because where I am, it's a greatplace at night to view the
stars. There's not a lot oflight pollution. And I just am
fascinated and I love love thenight sky. And I was wondering
what to talk about today. Socreativity came to mind because

(04:33):
I wonder. And I mentioned this,I think to my sister in law and
my brother, how the world wouldbe and this is like with any
marginalized or underrepresentedgroup in any field. How the
world would be would be if mostof the people highlighted were

(04:53):
black and brown, most of theblack and brown scientists of
the world. You know Beforehighlighted and and their
contributions and supported,right, what would the world be
like? And Shonda prescod.
Weinstein is a physicist, shehas her PhD, she's one of fewer

(05:16):
than 100 black American women toearn a PhD from the Department
of Physics prescod Weinsteinpresents a vision of the
universe I'm reading from theinside cover that is vibrant
buoyantly, non traditional andgrounded in black feminist

(05:36):
lineages. In the book she alsoidentified identifies as an a
gender woman. And now this wastricky for me, because I was
looking up a gender. And itseems that that's a term that's
used for someone who doesn'tidentify with any gender in
terms of like masculine, or likemale or female. But I think that

(06:03):
age, gender, woman part that shespeaks to what I've come across,
and Philip, please help me ifyou're listening is has to do
with, like what she aligns with.
So a gender who's a black, agender, woman, physicist and

(06:28):
brings in her identity into thisbook, which I think is wonderful
for people of color to see andhear about, and white
individuals as well. So let mejust unplug because I'm like a
geek about the cosmos andscience. And I actually got it

(06:52):
like Quantum Physics for dummieslast summer. I had no clue what
the hell was going on. But I gotit because I'm like, this is
seems really interesting, reallyinteresting stuff. Like I want
to know a little bit more aboutit. I think I got through the
introduction, and that's aboutit. But let me read her first
page, and then I'm going to go alittle bit further into the book
and it might get hot dependingon your identity. This might be

(07:19):
hard for you to hear. But pleaselisten. ls ask is for you to
listen. So in the beginning ofbedtime story, once upon a time
there was a universe, we're notsure how it started or whether
there is a reason, we don'tknow. For example, if space time
is ordered or disordered at thesmallest scales, which are

(07:41):
dominated by the weirdness ofquantum mechanics, we are pretty
sure that during the firstsliver of a trillionth of a
second, it expanded very rapidlyso that for the most part, it
looked the same in everydirection and look the same from
every position, it was samenesseverywhere, except the particle

(08:01):
started to flip out of nothingdue to random fluctuations
caused by quantum effects. Maybein space time, we are still not
super sure about that. Thenagain, we are not super sure
about this either. For somereason those particles formed
more matter than anti matter.
That process which formed aparticle type called baryons is
called Vario Genesis. Fromthere, these baryons started to

(08:28):
form structures and from thosestructures stars formed. Then
the stars got old and some ofthem died in super epic, rather
fabulous fashion. They explodedinto supernova, making heavy
elements. Sorry,like carbon and oxygen in the

(08:54):
process. Those elements went onto be the basis for all life on
Earth. Earth is a planet one ofthe structures that formed
around stars from the leftoversof Novi, eventually a smaller
type of structure that we calllife forms on Earth. Some other
life forms that evolved throughrelatively hairless apes that

(09:14):
use a variety of methods ofcommunication. There were about
7 billion of these apes withvarious levels of eumelanin and
feel melanin in their skin, andhair, giving them a range of
colors. The Apes also have a lotof different hair textures. Some
of the ones with less eumelaninhave for a long time now been

(09:35):
cruel to the ones with more,some of whom we know as, quote,
black people. We know why thisis, although we don't fully
understand the why but it mightbe due to laziness or because
they are jealous of our bogie.
But despite this, Black Livescome from the same Vario Genesis

(09:59):
the same supernova and the samestructure formation, no matter
what the lowest you willmelanin, people say, black lives
or star stuff. And Black LivesMatter, all of them. So that's
how she starts her book. Shegoes on to talk about, you know,

(10:20):
the science and history behindphysics. And then in what I like
is there aren't when I'mthinking of science books,
identity isn't explicitly talkedabout the cheeks implicitly

(10:42):
addresses it here. I'm goinginto a chapter called the
physics of melanin, you know,melanin? Is that part of our
bodies? And the more melanin youhave, the darker you have, the
less melanin you have the ladyyou have, the lighter you are.
And she identifies as a lightskinned black individual. And

(11:06):
she's fully aware of how, andshe speaks to it. In her book,
that the world in how you'reperceived, whether you're a
light skinned, black individual,and that I would say, brown as
well, or dark skin, black orbrown individual, the world
treats you differently. And itwas really interesting how in

(11:34):
Fox News, I know, I don't watchit, but it's on in the
background. I can't believe thatmy dad watches it. And I'm
admitted that to the world, butit's true. He does. It's kind of
scary. But it's actually very,it's it's really scary actually.
Well, first of all, because it'smy dad. But second of all, that

(11:55):
a lot of individuals listen toinformation, like that's put out
by Fox News. And one of the Idon't know what show it was, but
it was talking about criticalrace theory. So critical race
theory, is the idea that you aretreated a certain way because of

(12:21):
who you are. And in some casethat treatment is
discriminatory, right? So let'slook at the legal system. And
this came out of actually,someone and I can't remember who
the person was looking at casesthat were very similar with the
charge and with whatever wasgoing on. But black individuals

(12:46):
were being charged more harshlythan white individuals. And this
was seen over and over and overagain. And after enough of these
observations, this individualcame up with the idea of
critical race theory that youare treated a certain way in
this world. And in some waysthat's discriminatory. And in

(13:08):
some ways, it's a privilege. Imean, this is literally
something that we teach, that Ihad co taught before with
another teacher, and it'scalled, you know, it's either
privilege or discrimination inthese systems, like the
political system, or the legalsystem, or the economic system,
you know, whatever the case isthat you might have a privilege,

(13:34):
or you might be discriminatedagainst because of who you are
socially significant identity,whether it's gender, sexuality,
your socio economic status. AndI like the fact that she talks
about it in this book, becauseit's important, we need to talk
about it, andshe is also conscious of her
light skinburness right. Andthat doesn't go unnoticed, as

(13:57):
well, for me being a lighterskin, Puerto Rican as compared
to Puerto Ricans who are a lotdarker than I am. It doesn't go
unnoticed. Anyway, those are mythoughts about that. But let me
talk about a part in the bookwhere she talks about the

(14:19):
physics of melanin. Let's seehere. And she goes into win. I
am going into the book now andthese are words. When I finally
beginning began asking questionsabout melanin. I approached it

(14:39):
like a scientist by searchingthe scientific literature. I was
surprised to learn that melaninis becoming an active, active
topic in bio physics after a fewcenturies of what I would call
her Oh half heartedinvestigations investigation. By
racist. Now, people want tounderstand how melanin works as

(15:03):
a material and what utility itmight have for future
technologies to basicallyunderstanding how we get our
skin color and how this is goingto help us in the future, right?
What might have been differentif, for example, they hadn't
been distracted for about half acentury by the pseudoscience of

(15:24):
eugenics, which is consideredfoundational until the Holocaust
helped some understand itssocial implications. eugenics is
another word for Greek, withGreek roots formed from EU which
means good and Geno's, whichmeans race and that captures the
intentions of the field choosingwho lives or dies, or ever even

(15:47):
comes to exist at all, usingrules developed by people with
the power to make the rulesalthough you Genesis ideas
predate the rise of whitesupremacy. eugenics has been a
cornerstone of science underwhite supremacy that even today
continues to thrive in somecorners of science. So listen

(16:07):
carefully here. Although openlyEugene, eugenicist ideas are
considered to be somewhatfringe, it is still clear from
anthropology, anthropologicalstudies of science that the
biology of the disempoweredokay. Such as people with X X
chromosomes, often identified aswomen of any race is less likely

(16:32):
to be studied. In decisionGeneral, women are less likely
to be studied. When I learnedthat melanin had finally become
a popular topic, not because itwas realized that people of
African descent are interestingin our own right. But because so
many white people are gettingskin cancer. I was pained, but

(16:54):
not surprised. So I need torepeat that again. Listen
carefully, when I learned thatmelanin had finally become a
popular topic, not because itwas realized that people of
African descent are interestedin our own right, but because so
many white people are gettingskin cancer. I was pained, but

(17:16):
not surprised. I mean, this isnot the first time we've seen
something like that, where interms of the economy, and
benefiting one group over theother, let's look at marijuana
for example, how many black andbrown individuals are in jail or

(17:41):
have been jailed for dealing orthe use and now how and who,
what individuals are makingmoney off the legalization of
it. painful, but not surprisingpeople. I mean, for some people.
They might be surprised, butthis is how this is like,

(18:05):
happens all the time. So aftergoing back to the book after
centuries of kidnapping, lockingup beating, raping, robbing and
killing people in large part onthe basis of the human eyes,
perception of skin melanin,melanin content. Studying the
mechanical nature of melanin,its interactions with light and

(18:27):
its movement and production inthe body became interesting,
only when it seemed necessaryfor an enhancing the survival of
people who don't have a lot ofit in their skin.
This parallels the violentexperiments of 19th century

(18:50):
gynecologists, J. Marion Sims,who took an interest in black
woman's reproductive systemsonly because of what they would
reveal about how to medicallytreat white women. Simms is
still celebrated in somequarters, even though he
effectively tortured black womenby cutting them open without

(19:12):
anesthesia, arguing that wecould not feel pain. The
comedian I'm coming out of thebook for a second Wanda Sykes,
gay African American comediantalks about getting a double

(19:32):
mastectomy and one of her standup shows and she jokes about it
but was very serious. Becauseone of the things she said was
when she left the hospital. Bythe way after her procedure,
both of her breasts wereremoved. They gave her ibuprofen

(19:59):
ibuprofen And she's like,really? She addresses it in her
skit in a very powerful way,like, Oh, you don't really need
anything stronger than that youhear some ibuprofen on your way
out. But essentially, thisindividual did the same. Sims

(20:24):
tortured black women by cuttingthem open without anesthesia,
arguing that we could not feelpain. melanin isn't the first
sight on black bodies thatbecame curious when it served
the health of non black people.
And you're like doing what doesthis have to do with creativity?
That's a good question. One. Myfirst thought was, what if the

(20:49):
world were different ifscientists or any other group or
field had mostly black and brownindividuals, for one, black
woman wouldn't have been cutopen without anesthesia? You
know, and you're like, well,would have been the same the

(21:11):
other way which people have donethis to white individuals? I
don't know. necessarily, we'llnever know. We won't. But the
substance used, I'm going backin the book here, actually, I'm
gonna go. I'm gonna fast forwarda little bit. She talks about an
article that she wrote, in termsof how is melanin, you know,

(21:43):
what can we use melanin for? Tohelp the world you know, and
how, I mean, we don't knowessentially, how different
things will be used in theworld, like who would have
thought like, I don't know, whenI was a child, I probably didn't
think about oh, we can useelectricity for cars, you know,

(22:06):
like, all these different thingsthat we are using and coming up
with, who knows how melanin willbe used in the future. And she
talks about that, like melanin,may hold the key to delivering
our green energy futureefficiently. If we make an
ethical commitment to using thetechnology for the greater good,

(22:28):
then sadly, such commitmentsaren't yet a normal part of
scientific tradition. You know,so who knows how this might be
used? Of course, we may and thenI'm going to go back into the
book. Of course, we may be wrongabout Mellon instruction,
perhaps it cannot provideinsight into superconductors at
all, you know, to how it can beused in these fabulous ways that
might help. It may instead bewhat is called an electric,

(22:54):
electronic ionic hybridconductor, where the key actors
are not just electrons, but alsoions. So you know, she talks
about the science behind it. Butshe also brings in her
humaneness. And what all thismeans is that melanin, the

(23:16):
material that eugenics,eugenicist argued calls to
people of African descent to beinherently inferior is also the
stuff of Afro futurist technodreams. There is a very real
possibility that our futureenergy distribution mechanisms,
which will help minimizedamaging carbon emissions by

(23:37):
reducing waste in transportingenergy from source to use site
will exist because of the melonated people.
Janell Monet called the quote,arc enjoyed, or orchestrated in
quote, and maybe that the key toa future where we live more
harmoniously with our ecosystemis written into the genetic code

(24:01):
of black people. June Jordan didalways tell us that, quote, We
are the ones we have beenwaiting for, and quote. So she
published an article about thisidea, you know, about the idea
of melanin being treated,treated as a useful tool. And
then people at MIT built these,what I'm going to call smaller

(24:28):
structures, or, you know, threedimensional rectangular boxes
filled with different colors ofmelanin, with melanin of
different colors. And there wasnot one group at the time of in
this MIT group that was either ablack student, postdoctoral
researcher or staff and shewrites except maybe in all

(24:51):
likelihood, the people who cleantheir workspaces and you're
like, what's the big deal there?
You know, like, She states. Iworried that the essay that this
chapter is based on her Sorry,I'm going to go back a few
sentences. My heart sank when Iread about this, you know, the

(25:13):
group at MIT in fact, it wasdemoralizing. I worried that the
essay that this chapter is basedon had inspired the work and was
reminded of the importance ofbeing conscious of how our
proposals might be used. Oncethey are let loose into the
wider world, I did not mean topropose that scientists should
consider ideas like buildingsliterally shrouded in something

(25:37):
akin to the skin of black folks.
I had hoped to make the caseinstead that the underexplored
realm of melanin science,pointed to a need for science to
stop rejecting black people'shumanity, including the ways
that black scientists can shapeactual science. What I really

(26:00):
wanted everyone to understand isthat black thoughts like Black
Lives Matter. In the wake ofslavery, black people around the
America suffer immensely underanti black racism to lesser and
greater degrees depending on theIE melanin content, our DNA is
encoded to produce. Rememberwhat I said the lighter you are,

(26:20):
you're treated differentlycompared to the darker you are.
The encoding varies for reasonsthat are not at all random. We
know that the majority of blackAmericans have some European
European heritage mostly due torape and certainly this must
generally be true across the twoAmerican continents. I am what
is called light skinned peopleoften assume that this lightness

(26:42):
is simply because my father is awhite man, and indeed he is a
white ash can not see you. I amlight skinned because of who my
dad is. Yes, but I am also lightskinned because of who my for
Mother's rapists were. My motheris not nearly as light as me,
but she is also on the lighterend of the spectrum. Our melanin

(27:04):
and our lack thereof, tellstories about what ancestors
endured. In a differentscenario, black people are not
material product that can bestripped for parts, but more
like the Marvel comic bookuniverse character princess
Sheree of Wakanda. She's a blackwoman who likes tinkering with
things and spends and enoughtime both tinkering and

(27:27):
imagining that she comes up withwonderful new inventions and new
ways of seeing the world. In acompletely different context.
And melanin coated coatedbuilding sound cool like
something black and brown peoplewould think of out of a deep
understanding of our skin andthe pride in its technological

(27:48):
reach. This is substantivelydifferent from white people
thinking of new ways to use ourbodies. I am not the only black
scientist who identified withSheree when the film Black
Panther came out. So many of usspent our whole childhood

(28:12):
dreaming of becoming her. onlyto realize that in a white
supremacist society, it feelsimpossible. Sure, he is what
happens when indigenousintellectual curiosity is not
stifled. America is what happenswhen it is who it's a lot to

(28:37):
take in. But it's all realpeople. She talks about growing
up I watched that I'm going toactually start to go back on
paragraph a little bit.

(28:57):
Africans were brutallykidnapped, held captive,
enslaved, forced to buildfamilies and make new
generations in captivity.
required to enter in newlanguages and we did. Growing up
I watched my mother experiencedracism and as her child this
became part of my earliestencounters with the world. Later
I became a conch. I becameconscious of racisms distinct

(29:20):
impact on me. Even as colorismliterally lightens my load
compared to many black people.
For people with far more melaninin their skin than me or even my
mother, the viciousness ofstructural racism is more ever
present in daily life. Theincidences are more frequent,

(29:43):
more heightened and more likelyto be dangerous. For these
reasons, it's tempting to defineblackness as a response to the
question how badly do whitepeople treat you? It's also
tempting to define blackness ascoming from suffering as living
through suffering as a source ofsuffering. It's tempting to make
blackness and suffering andmelanin synonyms. As if that is

(30:07):
all we are. But as a communitythat was forced to construct
from fragments in the harshestphysical and psychological
conditions, we have beenintensely creative. Our
ancestors never stoppedimagining us as free people. And
by holding fiercely on to thisimagined black future, they

(30:29):
ensure that black people likeme, would one day be able to
look at the stars, not becausewe are on the run from slave
catchers, not because we aretrapped in fields. But because
we are learned in our firstsemester as PhD students in
astronomy, about how stars arejust perpetual nuclear
explosions. This is a blackmagic that as a scientist, I

(30:51):
believe in the ancestors madesure that we got here to now
where there are newpossibilities where we are now
able to ask the question, whatis the physics of melanin? We
now live in a world where blackscientists can ask that question
and understand in technicaldetail, how knowing the answer

(31:15):
could radically change theworld. If you are a teacher, if
you were a parent, if you are anadult in some capacity, caring
for black and brown children, orany other underrepresented, it's

(31:37):
female or a gay child, whateverthe case may be, give them space
to be creative. Because I thinkcreativity has historically been

(31:57):
a luxury.
But creativity has always been apart of our DNA.
But let's label it and give ourkids that space. Because we need

(32:26):
more balance, more black, brownwomen, gay age, gender.
Individuals looking at the worldand helping us understand in a
different way.

(32:51):
Something I think, okay, people,accept your sparkle, surrender
to it, and allow it to be sountil then, keep shining