Australian science
By Michael J. Leach and Rachel Rayner
poems oft explore life death
theories space horses
We recently conducted a novel study to describe the demographics and characteristics of contemporary Australian science poetry. Twelve contemporary Australian poetry or science writing anthologies were used to identify science poems matching a set definition built from our research. After finding 100 contemporary Australian science poems by 73 poets, we proceeded to collect and analyse data on poem characteristics as well as poet demographics.
The specific scientific topics addressed in the 100 science poems were visualised in a word cloud – an image that uses font size to show the relative frequency with which words appear in a dataset. This sciku presents some of the standout features from our word cloud of contemporary Australian science poetry topics.
Other results from the study showed the state of New South Wales produced the most science poets; however, the Australian Capital Territory had more poets per capita. Finally, contrary to usual publication statistics, there were more science poems written by female-identifying poets than male or non-binary individuals.
Full details of our study can be found in a peer-reviewed research paper:
Leach MJ, Rayner R. The demographics and characteristics of contemporary Australian science poetry. Axon: Creative Explorations. 2020; 10(1). Available at: https://www.axonjournal.com.au/issue-vol-10-no-1-may-2020/demographics-and-characteristics-contemporary-australian-science-poetry
Michael J. Leach (@m_jleach) is a poet and Senior Lecturer at Monash University. Michael’s poems have appeared in the Antarctic Poetry Exhibition, the Medical Journal of Australia, GRAVITON, and elsewhere. Check out an earlier sciku of Michael’s here.
Rachel Rayner (@RaeRay4) is a science communicator at experimental PR and communications company, AndironGroup. Rachel connects with audiences through various means – whether articles, educational activities, live shows, broadcasts or poetry.
If you enjoyed Michael and Rachel’s sciku then make sure you check out their longer poems in the first issue of Consilience here!