Science Communication
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Science Popularization vs Science Communication
I have been a science popularizer for over three-and-a-half decades; I have been a science communicator for just a tad more than one decade. What’s the difference you might ask? A science popularizer is often a scientist with a good turn of phrase or an engaging personality who is able to communicate scientific ideas and facts to the non-specialist in ways that are digestible – entertaining even. It may, less often, be a nonscientist who is able to burrow into the world of science and re-constitute it in a way that is fun and insightful: someone like, say, Bill Bryson. In fact, such science popularization is a part of what…
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Science Communication: the Chilean way
From the end of the world, here comes the Outreach League, a network of women communicators from five Chilean Research Centers who joined efforts to collaborate in science communication inititatives. Because you can’t efectively spread the word alone, can you? We are a team of science communicator practicioners, teachers and researchers who together combine lessons learned in a decade of solo work. Our League is commited to raise the standards of the traditional exercise of science communication in our country, where efforts are usually passionate and good willed, but lack methodology, creativity and self-criticism. No one asked us, but we have strong ideas about how science outreach should be developed…
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Video as a Tool for Science Communication
Let me tell you a short personal anecdote. Twenty-six years ago, I joined the University of Navarra (Spain) to run a small audiovisual production center called Euroview, whose main goal was to produce audiovisual materials with scientific content. One of the new team’s first initiatives was to organize a meeting of all researchers who might be interested in producing videos to raise awareness of their work. Since there were over 2,000 researchers at the University at that time, we booked a huge room in anticipation of a massive turnout. You can imagine our bitter disappointment when just two scientists turned up. I’ve recalled that anecdote many times over the years,…
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The Role of Storytelling in Communicating Science: Marina Joubert interviews Lloyd Spencer Davis
I have been out of action: a combination of illness, travel, and other commitments. I could tell you a story about that, but I thought instead, I’d share this with you, which is all about the place of stories in science communication. A couple of years ago, I was in South Africa, where the lovely Marina Joubert looked after me and my family brilliantly and very generously. She exacted only an ounce of flesh from me in exchange: this interview, which was for the six-week online course she runs about science communication http://www0.sun.ac.za/scicom/course/. Marina is the senior science communication researcher at Stellenbosch University’s Centre for Research on Evaluation, Science and Technology (CREST). She…
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PCST 2018 Video
Okay, this is a little different. If a picture can tell a thousand words, then by posting a video, I should pretty much not have to say anything at all! This is a video made by Tourism New Zealand to capture the essence of the Public Communication of Science and Technology (PCST) Conference held in Dunedin, New Zealand from 3-6 April, 2018: The next conference will be in Scotland in 2020. Make sure you go and don’t miss out on all that the PCST Conferences have to offer for anyone interested in the area of science communication,. Photo: Plenary Panel at PCST 2018 featuring (left to right): Marina Joubert, Jan…
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Science Communication should wear its Heart more on its Sleeve
Recently, I was a co-author of a paper published in the journal Environmental Communication examining the differences and similarities between science communication and environmental communication. The paper covers many aspects, from the historical development of each field of study to overlaps in scope and differences in focus. However, there was one point that emerged from our review that seemed more salient to me than all the rest; at least as it applies to those of us who purport to be science communicators. Almost all science communication is concerned with the transfer of knowledge about issues involving science and technology. Yet, much like the discipline we report on, science communicators tend…
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Let’s Communicate Science with Football
Today I watched the magnificent Tom Brady lead the Patriots to a win in the American Football Conference Finals over the Jaguars and gain yet another berth in a Super Bowl. It was a remarkable game that the Jaguars could easily have won – probably should have won – were it not for the Tom Factor. Behind throughout, the Patriots went into the final quarter with only 10 points to the Jaguars’ 20. Yet two touchdown drives, directed by the unflappable Mr Brady, left the Patriots as eventual four-point winners. It is hard not to feel both awed and meagre when admiring the feats of Brady, in a similar way…
