Today I interviewed Dr. Amanda Sonnega Ph.D. who I introduced in a previous blog. I decided to interview her because I wanted to follow up on the concept of a gap in the accessibility of science writing and segway into my next paper on how writing should be taught at the university. I thought she would have an interesting perspective on these concepts from her own writing background and experience teaching scientific writing to undergraduates. I was nervous before the interview because I wasn’t sure how she would receive my questions. I was most curious and apprehensive about how she would respond to my idea of this gap in science accessibility.
The interview went very well, she was enthusiastic and had some very insightful input. I asked her about her experiences teaching scientific writing, her own writing experiences, and how important it is to broaden the audience of scientific writing and how we should approach it. We ended up talking a lot about how flaws in the education system and scientific community limit the scientific literacy of the general population. She proposed that there should be a career focused on linking the scientific community and general public. This career would require extensive training in a specific field and would have a mission of making the science being done understandable and demonstrating the relevance to the general public. This proposed “science translator,” is in essence the ultimate public intellectual.
We also discussed how the responsibility of translating and sharing this information may reside with the scientists and researchers. Scientists’ jobs include researching, writing articles, teaching, and service. Dr. Sonnega explained that the service component is often fulfilled by sitting on boards, but outreach efforts should be stressed instead. She had the unique position of being a science writer for the Michigan Retirement Research Center where she wrote briefs describing the research and relevance to policy makers. Although this may be considered more public policy than scientific writing, this concept of translating to a broader audience is the same.
She made me think about a lot of important issues in the fields of public policy and science and I hope that I made her ponder some possibilities as well. I’m excited to reflect on some of these ideas in my paper but I’m somewhat worried that I am not approaching the prompt in the right way. I focused much less on her idea of argumentation and writing process and more on big picture issues regarding writing in the field.
Whether I approached this correctly or not, this has made me think a lot about writing, the field of movement science, and where I am going to fit in all of it. Dr. Sonnega also touched on how movement science is such a cross-disciplinary study that people have a hard time classifying it like they want to. It is so broad that it is important to find you’re a unique angle. But ultimately this is the key in any field, to find or develop your own niche and occupy it.
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