Higher education physics has long been a field with a disproportionately skewed representation in terms of gender, class, and ethnicity. Responding to this challenge, this study explores the trajectories of “unexpected” (i.e., demographically under-represented) students into higher education physics. Based on timeline-guided life-history interviews with 21 students enrolled in university physics programs across Sweden, the students’ accounts of their trajectories into physics are analyzed as choice narratives. The analysis explores what ingredients are used to tell a legitimate story of physics participation, in relation to dominant discourses in physics culture, and wider social and political discourses. Results indicate that students narrate their choice as based on motivations of physics being a prestigious and challenging subject, of a deep interest in and a natural ability for physics, as well as a wish to use physics for contributing to the world. While most of these affiliations to physics has been documented in earlier research, the study shows how they are negotiated in relation to social locations such as gender, class and migration history, and used to perform an authentic and legitimate choice narrative in the interview situation. Furthermore, the study reports and discusses the possibility of conceiving the role of physics in students’ lives as something beyond a “pure”, intellectually challenging, and “prestigious” subject. In contrast, and with implications for widening participation, the stories of “unexpected” physics students indicate that physics can be reconceived as socially and altruistically oriented.

高等教育物理学长期以来一直是一个在性别、阶级和种族方面代表性不成比例的领域。为了应对这一挑战，本研究探讨了“意外”（即人口统计学上代表性不足）学生进入高等教育物理的轨迹。根据对瑞典各地大学物理课程的 21 名学生进行的按时间线引导的生活史访谈，将这些学生对其进入物理学的轨迹的描述作为选择叙述进行分析。该分析探讨了使用哪些成分来讲述物理参与的合法故事，与物理文化中的主导话语以及更广泛的社会和政治话语相关。结果表明，学生们的选择是基于以下动机：物理学是一门享有盛誉且具有挑战性的学科，对物理学有浓厚的兴趣和天生的能力，以及希望利用物理学为世界做出贡献。虽然大多数这些与物理学的联系已在早期研究中记录下来，但该研究展示了它们如何与性别、阶级和移民历史等社会位置相关，并用于在访谈情境中进行真实且合理的选择叙述。此外，该研究报告并讨论了将物理在学生生活中的作用视为超越“纯粹”、具有智力挑战性和“声望”的学科的可能性。相比之下，“意想不到的”物理学学生的故事表明，物理学可以被重新理解为社会和利他主义导向，这对扩大参与具有影响。