The other day, as my husband acquired coffee in a cafe at a location quite remote from our home, the barista announced that he was going to guess my husband's profession. He guessed Silicon Valley software engineer. Not bad: from a distance, science professor isn't so different from various types of engineers, at least the sort who tend to be in casual attire.
My experience has been that it is a little more challenging for people to guess my profession from my attire/appearance, but that is mostly because many people have different expectations about women (just one small example is here). In many cases, I don't mind (it can be fun to surprise people and overturn their expectations), but in some cases I do (if people are rude/patronizing).
At a large conference, it is quite easy to pick out fellow conference-goers (male and female) on the street, even those individuals who remember to take off their conference badges/name-tags when they emerge from the conference center. This is easy in part owing to the tendency of conference-going scientists to roam in packs on city streets, but even when sighted in small units (1-2), it is easy to spot the science people.
In fact, at a very early age, my daughter learned how to Detect Scientists on the street. When she has attended conferences with her scientist parents, a favorite activity has been to sit in a cafe near but not too near the conference center, and try to pick the scientists out of the crowd of passersby. Perhaps she can use these skills later in life.
Can people guess what you do (approximately) for your job based on your appearance or are you constantly surprising people when you tell them what you do? Somehow I think this might break down somewhat along gender lines, but I imagine that there are also men who don't look like a stereotypical scientist (or engineer or whatever).
My husband is not one of these men, even when not wearing a graph-paper plaid shirt, but that's OK. I think it is important for the non-scientist population to know that nerds walk among us and are generally harmless and pleasant if supplied with sufficient quantities of coffee.
My experience has been that it is a little more challenging for people to guess my profession from my attire/appearance, but that is mostly because many people have different expectations about women (just one small example is here). In many cases, I don't mind (it can be fun to surprise people and overturn their expectations), but in some cases I do (if people are rude/patronizing).
At a large conference, it is quite easy to pick out fellow conference-goers (male and female) on the street, even those individuals who remember to take off their conference badges/name-tags when they emerge from the conference center. This is easy in part owing to the tendency of conference-going scientists to roam in packs on city streets, but even when sighted in small units (1-2), it is easy to spot the science people.
In fact, at a very early age, my daughter learned how to Detect Scientists on the street. When she has attended conferences with her scientist parents, a favorite activity has been to sit in a cafe near but not too near the conference center, and try to pick the scientists out of the crowd of passersby. Perhaps she can use these skills later in life.
Can people guess what you do (approximately) for your job based on your appearance or are you constantly surprising people when you tell them what you do? Somehow I think this might break down somewhat along gender lines, but I imagine that there are also men who don't look like a stereotypical scientist (or engineer or whatever).
My husband is not one of these men, even when not wearing a graph-paper plaid shirt, but that's OK. I think it is important for the non-scientist population to know that nerds walk among us and are generally harmless and pleasant if supplied with sufficient quantities of coffee.
