Is your message heard?
Today in class it dawned on me that some of the greatest, most credible information is relatively unavailable. Scholars write in journals which are more than likely read only by other scholars who are researching to write about a similar topic. Maybe I’m missing something, but it seems that most people dont pick up journals to read for fun. Obviously, these journals are written to a specific audience for specific reasons, but I wonder if they’ve ever considered whether that audience is correct. I wonder if they have considered who would benefit most from the message they have to share.
Horrible analogy
Consider the photograph above. You can see a basketball player, taking what looks to be a great shot. Upon closer inspection, you realize that he is facing the wrong direction, and shooting the ball into the stadium. He obviously knows how to shoot the ball, but he’s simply not aiming it in a direction that will bring his team points and help them win the game.
It seems that academic journals contain extremely useful information, but seems to be written and packaged in a way that benefits few, just as shooting a ball away from the hoop rarely benefits the team.
Wasted information
Let me share an example to illustrate what I’m trying to say. Today in my Anthropology 447 class, we discussed weaknesses of the field of anthropology. For those who don’t know, anthropology is the study of mankind, specifically culture, language, behaviors, etc. Anthropology has application in just about every different industry, business, and curriculum, particularly in todays world of international and intercultural communication. We talked about how many anthropologists will do field work for years, researching a specific group or culture. Then, at the end, they write an article for a journal.
The people they went to learn about and research, sometimes never see these writings. For those who do see the writing, they find it filled with jargons and deep academic styled writing, making it nearly impossible for the average reader to gain any insights from it. Lives could be saved, embarrassment avoided, money could be better spent, greater tasks could be accomplished if people understood cultures on a deeper level, or at least had some authoritative document to guide them in intercultural encounters in business and otherwise.
The Problem
Even though the study of anthropology and its resulting knowledge could be infinitely helpful to a number of people, the findings are difficult to find, and just as difficult to decipher. They were written to other scholars, with hopes of gaining their praise.
But, from a larger scale, how much valuable information never sees the light of day, simply because it was written in a journal instead of on a blog? How much is lost because journals were written so that only those with doctorates can understand instead of using language common to the public?
Questions to think about
- Would the research impact a larger audience were the writings to be collected in a different medium (like a blog, for instance)?
- Would the research impact more people if the langage used was more elementary, enabling the average reader to gain insight from the paper?
- Is there any ethical reason why these papers cannot be published in a broader environment? (I’m guessing this is a per project question to ask)
- Who would benefit most from the research? The scholars? The public?
My opinion
Although I think there is value in scholarly writing, it seems that a researcher’s greatest gift to society is the knowledge obtained through their research. It takes a true genius to unfold a difficult subject so simply that even a child could understand it. I’m not saying we have to make quantum physics readable on a third grade level, but perhaps we could consider the way our texts are written.
Do you think it would be better if scholars and professors wrote more on blogs in everyday langage or would it be better if they continue to write as they do now? Is there any problem with transitioning academic texts to a “wikipedia” writing style? What are some other examples of wasted information?
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