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Translating Researchese
- 1. Translating Researchese for Public Consumption Quisto Settle Ricky Telg
- 2. The Goal: Informing & engaging without dumbing things down
- 3. The Situation: Researchers speak a different language from the rest of us
- 4. Phosphorus in the +5 oxidation state (i.e., phosphate) is the most abundant form of phosphorus in the global ocean. An enigmatic pool of dissolved phosphonate molecules, with phosphorus in the +3 oxidation state, is also ubiquitous; however, cycling of phosphorus between oxidation states has remained poorly constrained. Using simple incubation and chromatography approaches, we measured the rate of the chemical reduction of phosphate to P(III) compounds in the western tropical North Atlantic Ocean. Colonial nitrogen-fixing cyanobacteria in surface waters played a critical role in phosphate reduction, but other classes of plankton, including potentially deep-water archaea, were also involved. These data are consistent with marine geochemical evidence and microbial genomic information, which together suggest the existence of a vast oceanic phosphorus redox cycle.
- 5. Who Am I?
- 6. Who Am I?
- 8. But Typically, It’s the Exception
- 9. The Problem: Confusing • Too Much • Too Complex
- 10. The Roots:
- 11. The Roots: Think public needs ever little detail Out of touch with non-experts They aren’t communicators
- 12. The more time you spend in academia, the more socially awkward you become
- 13. If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter
- 14. Tips & Example
- 22. Make Sure the Researcher is Relaxed Especially if you’re filming
- 23. Make Yourself Understand the Info • Follow the same route • Say it back to the researcher
Editor's Notes
- Let’s return to Dr. Gader. He’s a computer engineer. Exciting stuff. Really.
- When he works, he runs programs, and a bunch of numbers fly across the screen. Really, this exciting. You know why?
- Those numbers are used to improve landmine detection.
- It’s pretty easy to see that landmine detection is very impactful. It’s easy to see how his work could garner public interest.
- We just have to figure out how to tell his story. He may sit behind a computer for the bulk of his work, but his work can have a very real impact on the lives of others.
- Depending on what you’re doing, pre-interviewing can take care of a lot of the kinks in the system. If you’re shooting a video, it can allow you to have the story you’re telling figured out before you even take the camera out of its case. It’s almost like a preliminary interview where you can figure out what they’re doing. One of the things we did with the Explore Research project was have them fill out a worksheet before we met with them that got the researcher to think along the lines of communicating with a broader audience of this is what we were trying to find, so this is the research we conducted, and this is what we found and what it means for the general public.
- For me, the pre-interview process varied the two times I tried it for Explore Research. In one case, the researcher never did the worksheet, but I was able to do the pre-interview meeting, so I was able to start getting an idea of his research. This was the land mine guy. I had to have him explain algorthims for me, and I got an idea of the shots I wanted that would help the public understand what he did and what that impacted. It was during this process that I saw the inert landmines they keep in their lab space. Being around even an inactive landmine was terrifying for me (really, how was I to know it was really dead at this point?). This emotional involvement helped me tell the story of this very dry researcher. For the second research, I never got to do a full pre-interview, but he did do the sheet. that sheet helped guide the questions I asked him when I showed up that day. This was a geographer who was tracking malaria spread by the movement of people. The worksheet got him thinking in the way that we were going to tell the story, so this allowed me to know what questions I would ask, and gave me an idea of the possible side journeys I’d take once I was shooting.
- We all know interviews go easier if the other person’s relaxed and talking comfortably. Just a few things to be aware of: if you’re relaxed, they tend to be relaxed. In other words, leave your stress at the door. It’s now on you to set the right mood as best you can. Talk them through the process as much as you can. It’s like taking a little kid to the doctor. They’re more likely to spaz out if you surprise them with something. If you know something probably seems weird to them, go ahead and admit it. If you can laugh with them, that helps a lot. Again, a lot of these people aren’t communicators. They may not give many interviews (much less video if you’re going that route), so try to set a tone that helps them relax.