MbShea@PWP@English@UMCP

Some preparatory readings.

• Whiteside article about scientific writing, focus on IMRAD article
• Washington Post news article about federal employee responses to Trump Administration
• Poke around on Twitter for "alt,"rogue," and "ungagged" federal accounts (spend 15 minutes)

for spring 2017.  Here are the readings for the first week.

John Bohannon (molecular biology)

• Created “Dance Your PhD” contest (exercise in public audience communication). Here is the 2016 winning piece on biomedical invention. He explains more about why dance as a “text” for communicating complexity to lay people in this >

• TED method on a talk using dancers instead of Power Point (Here is the talk, in 11 minutes)

• Blogs at Science Magazine, including this really important fake paper experiment that exposed trouble in peer review/open access publishing.

Katharine Hayhoe  (atmospheric scientist)

• Part of her public communication of science is to reach a resistant audience about climate change. She uses many venues, including Youtube and Vimeo, as well as an excellent

• facebook page. Heyhoe really understands her audience, which is why she is rather successful in keeping this conversation civil and ongoing.

• Her “Global Weirding” YouTube channel is a series worth looking at.   

• Read more about her work at the Slate Bad Astronomer blog by scientist Phil Plait.

Randy Olson (marine biologist and filmmaker)

• Uses narrative structures from filming -- including storyboard analysis from South Park episodes -- to help scientists tell stories.

• Developed the ABT( AND BUT THEREFORE) technique for scientists.  If you check out this twitter feed, you will find that Dave Tilley tweets.  MEES’ Bill Dennison reviews Olson’s latest book: Houston, We have a Narrative

Your title should reflect the scope of your content and address the audience. 

In class, I will note the chief lapses in documents at the end of the semester:

• poor citation (please, seriously, do this well, with either formal citation as fits your field or natural language citation.  Some documents will use a combination of citation. For some of you, hyperlinks are a support to citation as well as courtesy to readers)
• document is out-of-control, in size.  You should have scoped that with me over the last two weeks.
• not adding the additional sources -- say two or three -- that you need to complete the argument.  You do not need to annotate new sources.
• making claims without evidence.  Support your document with the logos of evidence, including cases (these also invoke the subtle but powerful pathos of storytelling.
• changing your document without tell me.

Please, include your final audience analysis on the front of the document.  You can combine this with the cover sheet, if you like.

I would also like you to underline (pen or pencil) your thesis or problem statement.  This way, I am helped to see what you are doing NOW in this document, as this project has evolved.

Office hours this week:

Monday 12-12:45

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 11-1

Monday, December 19:  11-3.  I leave at 3 with all the folders, to go home and grade.

Post here, by midnight.

Pay attention to citation style: one through the document or changes in the document.

Range is formal -- author-date parenthetical citation -- to less formal -- natural language citation.

If you will use hyperlinks for a web-based document, see me.

Think headings and subheads.  Think if your work is divided into more than one document; if so, then think what the title is for each document in the set.  Post here.

For logos?  You need to describe early on the problem or intellectual question you are working on WITH QUANTIFIERS.  Most of you will need to consult a few more sources to complete this task.

Pathos -- is often in the background

Ethos -- the credibility of this, including how you write, cite, arrange, and present the information for your reader.

Also, some support on resume/cover letter preparation:

1. Tip Sheet on Resume Lapses/Sample Cover Letter and Guide 

Next up? Last short assignment, for Friday.