March 20, 2023

Spending time outdoors studying wild animals can be a joyful and rewarding part of a field scientist’s career. Researchers with marginalized identities, though, are more likely to have hostile, negative, or dangerous experiences while doing field work, which affects their physical and mental health, as well as their ability to conduct scientific research. In 2022, two ornithologists saw an opportunity to draw attention to this issue and founded a nonprofit called Field Inclusive.

Lauren D. Pharr, co-founder of Field Inclusive, is an avian ecologist who studies the impacts of climate change on avian behavioral responses. She is currently a PhD student at North Carolina State University pursuing her degree in Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology and studying the federally endangered red-cockaded woodpecker (​​Picoides borealis). She took time recently to speak with Wild Animal Initiative about raising awareness for social field safety and making field research less dangerous and more equitable. 

What motivated you to create Field Inclusive? How do safety concerns specifically related to discrimination impact field researchers and their ability to do their work?  

LP: Field Inclusive was started by two Black women and ornithologists, Murry Burgess and myself, Lauren D. Pharr, who recognized inequities surrounding field work and social field safety. Social field safety involves at-risk individuals, which include minority identities of the following: race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, gender identity, and religion. When individuals from these backgrounds enter unfamiliar communities in the course of field work, they may be placed in an uncomfortable and potentially unsafe, “othered” position, and prejudice may manifest against them. 

Having continued to conduct field work outdoors as a part of our PhD program requirements at North Carolina State University, and having witnessed and experienced some of these instances first hand, it was then that Murry and I knew that something had to be done, and that social field safety needs to be raised to the same level as the typical physical field safety — such as identifying poisonous plants and venomous animals, or watching out for stump holes — that is talked about in many institutions’ field safety seminars.

Black and other marginalized or historically excluded field researchers have always faced safety concerns while working, but Christian Cooper’s experience being racially profiled while birdwatching drew national attention to the issue in 2020. How did that event evolve the conversation around this topic?

LP: I am personally drawn to my good friend, colleague, and 2022 MacArthur Foundation Fellow J. Drew Lanham as a great example of this. Once news got around on what happened to Christian, which was very unfortunate, Drew took to writing, like he is so good at doing. From the events that happened with Christian, this led him to write his poem 9 Rules for the Black Birdwatcher. His YouTube video that he created about this went viral as well. In his poem, he uses satire to get points across that Black people are not safe birding. Plain and simple. Something that should be safe, and something that we should be able to enjoy, half the time we can't.

Carry your binoculars — and three forms of identification — at all times. 

Don’t bird in a hoodie. Ever. 

Lines from Drew's poem. These are the harsh realities of birding while Black. 

What role does education play in addressing some of these issues? What actions can the scientific community take to address racism, sexism, ableism, or other forms of discrimination that impact researchers in the field?

LP: Institutions and organizations need to become more aware of these certain field safety concerns. White privilege needs to be recognized. Marginalized and historically excluded biologists and researchers need to be heard. Once we can begin to address all this, then change can gradually come. If you are open and willing to become educated about these things, then you can start becoming an ally and learn how to promote a more inclusive and safe space for your minority researchers and workers. 

Are there any resources on this topic that you recommend?

LP: Field Inclusive hosted our first #FieldInclusiveWeek in January where we invited speakers to speak on various topics related to field safety concerns. Webinar recordings, speaker PDFs, and other resources can be found on our website. There is also a great academic paper, "Safe fieldwork strategies for at-risk individuals, their supervisors and institutions" by Demery et al. which talks about the importance of various social field safety issues.