1. What Are Rare Earth Elements?

Abstract

“In a way,” writes Abraham (2011), “it begins with semantic confusion” (101). Rare earths are not rare; the name says more about their scientific beginnings than their actual qualities. In 1788 a miner in Ytterby, Sweden, found a strange black rock that was identified in 1794 as a new kind of “earth”: an archaic term for acid-soluble elements¹ (Rowlatt 2014). Because it had not been found anywhere else, it was presumed to be scarce. Hence the name, rare earths. The implication of rarity mobilizes all sorts of sentiments that have legitimated the ruthless pursuit and capture of these elements over