Research
While working as an independent consultant [1] affiliated with Western Michigan University, [10] Dancy was a co-investigator of a US$ 300,000 grant awarded by the National Science Foundation in 2017 to investigate why white, male physicists fail to mitigate sexism and racism in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Out of the funding, The College Fix noted only one study was produced with a sample size of 27. [11]
The study, "How well-intentioned white male physicists maintain ignorance of inequity and justify inaction", was pre-published on ArXiv in 2022 [12] and published in the in 2023. [13] The study was conducted by Dancy and co-investigator Apriel Hodari, found that among a group of progressive white male physicists there are pervasive patterns of discourse that allow those individuals to maintain their identity as “good” or “equity-minded” while remaining largely inactive in confronting racism and sexism in physics. Patterns identified include distancing oneself from the problem, attributing causes to distant systems, and justifying inaction on grounds of ignorance, discomfort, or lack of agency. [10] Astrobites noted that the interview-based approach provides insight into how privileged physicists talk about inequity but is constrained by its small, self-selected sample of volunteers who already identified as “progressive,” limiting its applicability across the broader physics community. [14] Science reported that the study was representative of white privilege in the field, and a widespread lack of awareness about how privilege shapes attitudes and behavior in the field. [15]
