1:00pm-2:00pm on Saturday 29 March
Times shown are in GMT (UTC +0) up to the 26th March. For events on or after 27th March times are in BST (UTC +1).
Whipple Museum of the History of Science, Free School Lane, CB2 3RH
My name is Mallory Hrehor and my aim in this talk is to give an overview of the controversy on Mauna Kea and highlight the important lessons that come out of this case on what it means to have an inclusive science.
Mauna Kea is a sacred mountain in Hawai?i, yet it is also one of the best locations in the world for astronomy. Because of this, there have been large telescopes built on this mountain since the 1960's. The latest and largest of these telescopes, the Thirty Meter Telescope (or TMT for short), has sparked intense controversy between Native Hawaiians and the scientific community.
When we examine the ways that the scientific community tried to be inclusive of Native Hawaiians in the processes which determined whether TMT should be constructed on Mauna Kea or not, we will find that many of the attempts to be inclusive were often performative and did not result in better representation for Native interests.
In fact, in some instances, this kind of "inclusivity" was used to further silence Native Hawaiians. Let's look at what went wrong in this case and use it as a springboard to discuss better strategies for including minorities, and especially underprivileged or systemically oppressed minority groups, in scientific discourse.
