Opinions from Two: So What About You?
April 17th, 2007 | 
Author: I love hearing from Water Words readers, either by email or via the comment feature on the blog. In the past week, I received two emails conveying rather different perspectives on the challenge of science communications. Neither of them explicitly gave me permission to use their names, so I’ll just share excerpts.
The first viewer sent me email that included a letter to the editor that appeared in the Barre-Montpelier (VT) Times Argus on April 6. The letter author had written to protest the layoff of nine public affairs officers from state government:
They are responsible for taking the often incomprehensible arcanum of state government and translating it into useful and easily accessible information for the public. Making the process and products of government more understandable, and thereby more accessible, might serve to re-engage in the democratic process an increasingly disillusioned citizenry.
The letter writer seems to believe the onus falls on the government to take its message to the citizens. The second email was from a Department of Interior employee, who seems to believe that the citizens have at least some obligation to make an effort to understand the vernacular of these important issues. He wrote:
…some words are the words to use regardless of the knowledge base of the audience. Either that insults the audience or they really are ignorant.
This is a healthy debate for water experts to have and coincidentally, it’s raging within the wider scientific community right now. Check out posts on these blogs: Mixing Memory, Nobel Intent, and The Loom to see what the buzz is about.
You all know where I come down: I’m way past “whether” we should make an effort and I’m all about the “how” to do it. But, I’m sure everybody that has and does visit this blog has their own views on the subject.
So what do YOU think: Should we go to the public, or expect the public come to us?
If you’re willing to share your views publicly, click on the comments button below. If you want to share it privately, drop me a note a eric dot eckl at water words that work dot com.
Posted in Interview-Guest
Why should these approaches be mutually exclusive? The issue here is one of education. As a result, those that publish materials — in whatever media — have a responsibility to understand their audience (admittedly wider than ever before thanks to online technologies) and to provide at least a glossary or jargon-free summary to accompany their product, or to point readers in the direction of further information, background or otherwise.
Conversely, an issue as wide as water use and management attracts research and commentary from a wide variety of disciplines: natural sciences, engineering, social ecology, law, economics, politics, etc. For the non-expert to expect to consume these materials without at least some additional research and reading is often unlikely.
Ultimately, both sides will need to extend their hands toward each other and hope to connect somewhere in the middle; the days of sitting with arms folded and expecting your audience (or your government) to come to you are gone, if they ever existed. We increasingly need to see ourselves as participants, not consumers.
While I agree in principle with Dave that government agencies and the public should meet one another somewhere in the communication middle, it isn’t practical currently. Generally speaking, Americans are reactionary. Like with anything else, we will care deeply enough about water to learn the language when the supply or health of it are immediately threatened–I mean, really threatened. Until then, we in government agencies and private interest groups care more about water than the general public.
There is an addage related to interpersonal relationships that goes something to the effect of “He/she who appears to care less about the relationship is in control of the relationship.”
In our relationship with the general public about water, we care more and the public cares less. That means we have to try harder. That means…we have to speak their language.
As director of a community-based grassroots watershed team in Vermont, I find myself in the precarious position of straddling this very fence. I do the research, immersing myself in the writings of academia and the scientific community, and then I do my best to translate the technical jargon into information that the public, my stakeholders, can understand and (more importantly) can use.
At the moment, I am studying Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica), an invasive plant that is vigorously populating riverbanks and disturbed soils around our region. Well, around our country and our continent, more accurately. Sifting through the dissertations and research papers is challenge enough, but I also have to distill the political or personal bias from some of the actual information. This is especially true with research in the natural sciences ~ the topic of the environment polarizes people too easily, or people allow themselves to become polarized too easily.
I believe that the onus should be on the scientific community and academia TO SOME EXTENT to make their analyses and conclusions and discussions readable, succinct, and factual ~ they should clearly interpret their data for the reader. HOWEVER…it is completely up to the general public to make every effort to understand what is being written or said, and to FIND OUT about something if they don’t completely understand it.
I also believe that a huge portion of the problem is with the media’s representation of research as This Week’s Huge Discovery that puts an end to scientific debate…they sensationalize things to the point that average people think science is settled with each new study. Just look at all the fad diets that are spawned from nutritional research. If the media (and people!) would treat science as it is meant to be seen, as a series of baby-steps toward understanding a larger picture, we would all be better off and scientific discovery would make uncluttered advances every day.
Thank you all so much for your thoughtful comments. Experts of every variety have a challenge translating their vocabulary for public consumption. But more than in other fields, nature protection, and pollution control scientists, engineers, lawyers, and other experts are called upon to do just that.
The broad community has under-invested in both providing these experts with public communications training AND recruiting communications pros to help out.
I think you all deserve more appreciation, respect, and cooperation from the public at large than you are getting, and I am doing this blog to help you get it.
If we make an effort to present our work using language regular people understand and if we connect what we’re doing to what they already care about, we’ll get a lot more of that appreciation, respect, and cooperation. If we ask them to learn a lot of new words and begin to care about something they didn’t know before, some will — but most won’t.
Eric
One of the columnists in our local paper quoted you and talked about how big words make his head hurt (though he uses blovaiting to describe bureaucrts), I didn’t think it was fair. As a recent arrival in the Chesapeake Bay and South River watersheds, I am new to environmental advocacy. However, I have done a little research to understand what is happening. He quotes you as saying effective communication to the public is:
“Healthy skies and healthy forests,” for instance, and “make a difference” and “enough clean water for everybody.” People can relate to simple, clear terms like that.
http://www.hometownannapolis.com/cgi-bin/read/2007/04_16-39/OPN
These phrases remind me of the State of the Union, or any other prepared speech, where the words sound pretty but do not hold any meaning.
Wetlands restoration, biodiversity, and fossil fuels dependence are not difficult words. I resist the attempt to dumb down the conversation. What does Save the Bay mean anyway? People need small, concrete ways to see, understand, and impact their environemnt.
I’m also writing the local columnist. Thanks for working hard for change.
Hi Jason,
Welcome to the blog. I saw that article, too. Nice catch — the journalist complains about longwindedness but goes and uses a 50 cent word like “bloviating.” Very funny! I have no idea what that word means, actually.
But I don’t care enough to look it up, either. And that’s exactly the point: Most people won’t take the time to look up lots of words they don’t understand, and we use them all the time.
And if they don’t understand you, how are you going to persuade them to put rain barrels on their gutters, redo their driveway with porous pavement, buy a hybrid instead of a hummer, call their state senator when you need them to, or write a check to support your fine work?
eric, this is proably tacking and incorrect blog etiquette, but I cannot find you or anika’s email. please send bsemme@earthlink.net