Geologists: A social anthropologist's view
This was a piece originally commissioned by Brett Davis for Coring Magazine. As I have retained publication rights, I’m reposting an unexpurgated version here.
I come from a family of geologists. My father, sister and brother are trained geologists, as is my husband, my brother-in-law and my brother’s partner. Moreover, I was constantly surrounded by geologists growing up. Because my father is a retired academic geologist, we had a long parade of his PhD students staying with us throughout my childhood.
Despite the intensity of my exposure to the field, I have made a heroic effort to learn as little as humanly possible about geology. To my father’s intense dismay and my mother’s deep relief, I became a social anthropologist instead. Basically, my brain has been trained to go into ‘la-la’ mode as soon as rocks or mining stocks come up in dinner conversation. Still, I have picked up enough of the lingo over the years that I could probably pass as a geo—to a non-geologist, at least. For example, I don’t know what a porphyroblast inclusion trail is, but I know they are the key to orogenesis.
In what follows, drawing on my professional skills as a social anthropologist and my personal observations of geologists in their natural habit for the past 50-odd years, I aim to articulate the (ahem) core traits of The Geologist as a distinct social breed.
The first thing that strikes me is how well defined the contours of the geologist are in popular culture. Unlike most scientists, who are treated in TV and films as an undifferentiated, lab coat-wearing mass, geologists are portrayed as quite distinct. This difference was the source of a running gag in the TV show The Big Bang Theory, where they were the regular target of derision. Geologists, Sheldon (a theoretical physicist) frequently proclaimed, weren’t ‘real’ scientists—going so far as to assert that ‘Geology is the Kardashians of science’.
This is, in part, because geology is an interpretive science where what is observed in nature can’t be straightforwardly replicated in a lab. However, it probably doesn’t help that a high proportion of geological terms seem like they were coined by a horny teenager. To wit, conversations between geologists typically sound like they’re discussing the aftermath of a recent orgy—you’ll hear references to everything from cleavages, shafts, thrusts, cross-bedding, dry holes and orogenic belts to my personal favourite: dickite. (Seriously, who names a mineral ‘dickite’?)
Geologists are also presented as far more athletic and outgoing than your usual scientist—there is nary a lab coat to be found in the numerous films featuring them. Instead, the dress that geologists tend to be uniformly associated with is field gear: khakis, many-pocketed shirts or vests, boots, sports watches, etcetera. This look is exemplified by Brad Pitt’s fake geologist in the film Ocean’s Thirteen, although female geologists are often presented in much the same way—e.g., Rhonda in the 90s cult classic Tremors.
Also common to Hollywood depictions of geologists is a down-to-earth, straight-talking demeanour. Interestingly, despite the fact that most geologists work in an increasingly vilified and misunderstood industry (mining), geologists themselves are generally shown in a favourable light as honest, honourable types. In an analysis of representations of geologists on the silver screen, Erik Sturkell and his colleagues conclude that geology is generally portrayed as ‘an upstanding profession, albeit one with an appallingly high death rate’. (An inviolable rule of disaster films seems to be that unless the geologist is the main character, or their love interest, they’re going to die.)
The stereotype of the unflappable, down-to-earth geologist is probably best captured in the South African humorist James Clarke’s article about a failed Survivor-type series featuring geologists. The show never made it to air because the cast failed to generate the required level of dramatic tension, preferring to mostly work alone or in pairs, and the production budget was quickly overrun as a result of the costs of transporting their rock samples and keeping them supplied with beer. (Beer is a key part of the geologist’s professional identity, as a video from Wired magazine attests.)
Of course, these are stereotypes—I know plenty of geologists whose preferred choice of beverage is not beer, along with, admittedly, a very large proportion for whom it is. But there is probably a grain of truth to the stereotypes insofar as they provide a cultural model to emulate (albeit one that’s been called out for being hyper-masculine). For example, geologists unquestionably do tend to perform their identity through their choice of clothing. As I’ve previously noted in an analysis of LinkedIn profiles, geologists on the platform often eschew formal attire in favour of hard hats, high vis gear and khakis—unless, that is, they’ve moved into corporate roles.
I also find it interesting that of all the tools of the geologist’s trade, the one almost universally used to symbolise the profession is not a hand lens, compass, or indeed, rocks themselves, but the geopick (a.k.a. the rock hammer). While crossed geopicks might look like a symbol of fraternity to your average geologist, to virtually everyone else they look like an instrument of death, making them a far more aggressive logo than the beakers and atoms that tend to feature on the crests of chemistry and physics societies. For example, change the background of the following photo from the mountains of West Virginia to the streets of New York City and you could be looking at a scene from Gangs of New York.
A frequent topic of discussion on Nick Tate’s Geology Upskill channel, one gets the impression that the geopick is more than just a tool. Indeed, for most geologists I know, a geopick is multi-functional object, useful not just in obtaining rock samples but handy as a burglar deterrent, a substitute hammer and a virtually universal means of determining scale, not just in rock formations but whatever else you would like to measure, whether it be babies or cats. And, of course, there is a long history of geologists throwing geopicks for fun.
Still, although they might be rarely used to symbolise the discipline, for most geologists, the love of rocks runs deep. Indeed, geologists tend to love rocks in a way that’s deeply annoying to non-geologists—such as their tendency to stop in the middle of a highway to admire the cross bedding revealed by a road cutting. And trying to pick a stone countertop with a geologist? Save yourself some grief and go for engineered stone is my advice. You will be looking for a durable and attractive countertop for your kitchen or bathroom. They will be looking for one with visible garnets, or foliated gneiss, or fossilised ammonites, or whatever hastens the beat of their geologist’s heart.
And, for the love of god, do not get a geologist started on the topic of art—unless, that is, you want to hear someone wax lyrical about the beauty of thin sections viewed under a polarizing microscope, which every geologist I’ve ever met insists would make a fortune if someone decided to photograph them and sell them as art. (Newsflash, geologists: Etsy has been selling thin section art for years, and I doubt there are any millionaires amongst the sellers, so you have got to move on from the whole thin-section thing.)
Give that this article is being published in Coring Magazine, I have one final observation to make about geologists. If asked, most geologists will probably tell you that their natural adversary is drillers. As Erik C. Ronald observes, ‘Many geologists view drillers as most people view their home dishwasher: useful when working, messy when broken, but don’t try to get a meaningful conversation out of them’. Conversely, drillers view geologists as ‘overpaid, know-it-all, four-eyed oddball(s) who get their kicks licking rocks all day’.
However, I’m not convinced this is true—certainly in terms of the relationship between female geologists and drillers, most of whom, to quote one unnamed source, ‘have either dated a driller, or gone to a titty bar with one’. Based on my observations, the geologist’s greatest enemy is actually the mining engineer. Better at maths and less fond of the outdoors, mining engineers are typically paid higher salaries and are more likely to be groomed for management positions than geos. As the saying goes, ‘geologists create the dream; mining engineers kill it’.
In sum, love them or hate them, geologists have managed a feat that few other scientists have accomplished, which is to carve out a distinct public identity. Whether their reputation as the most grounded and down-to-earth of the sciences is deserved or bespeaks a serious failure of imagination, one thing’s for sure: geologists, as Bill Bryson observes, are never at a loss for paperweights.
You nailed it Kirsten. But then you would with your family. My wife, another long suffering self defense “la-la” person married to a geologist, had a good laugh.