TY - CHAP

T1 - Innovative Popular Science Communication? Materiality, Aesthetics and Gender in Science Slams

AU - Hill, Miira

PY - 2020/11/24

Y1 - 2020/11/24

N2 - This paper is about the communicative construction (Knoblauch 1995, 2017) of science communication in a popular genre called science slam, more precisely, within the context of the materiality, aesthetics and gender. In Science Slams, we can observe how popular scientists position themselves. Although seeing the success of female performances (for example Giulia Enders) might lead us to hope for new norms of gender, technical jargon, and visual practices in scientific communication, these hopes are not wholly fulfilled in the Science Slam genre. Our empirical observations (ethnography, video analysis, interviews) have shown that, even if the new genre seems to enable all kinds of revisionist representations of science for men, women remain silent and invisible. Although the technical jargon and visual practices of Science Slammers is quite different from that used in university lectures, marginalization of gender, among other groups, remains an issue. Drawing on typical tropes of patriarchal societies, successful Science Slams women are presented as objects of desire, hardworking assistants, or aunts, mothers, and grandmothers. In this way, the Science Slam could be understood as expression of a still problematic gender relation in science.

AB - This paper is about the communicative construction (Knoblauch 1995, 2017) of science communication in a popular genre called science slam, more precisely, within the context of the materiality, aesthetics and gender. In Science Slams, we can observe how popular scientists position themselves. Although seeing the success of female performances (for example Giulia Enders) might lead us to hope for new norms of gender, technical jargon, and visual practices in scientific communication, these hopes are not wholly fulfilled in the Science Slam genre. Our empirical observations (ethnography, video analysis, interviews) have shown that, even if the new genre seems to enable all kinds of revisionist representations of science for men, women remain silent and invisible. Although the technical jargon and visual practices of Science Slammers is quite different from that used in university lectures, marginalization of gender, among other groups, remains an issue. Drawing on typical tropes of patriarchal societies, successful Science Slams women are presented as objects of desire, hardworking assistants, or aunts, mothers, and grandmothers. In this way, the Science Slam could be understood as expression of a still problematic gender relation in science.

KW - Media and communication studies

UR - https://www.transcript-verlag.de/detail/index/sArticle/4660&number=978-3-8376-4835-5

UR - http://d-nb.info/1183942575

M3 - Article in conference proceedings

SN - 978-3-8376-4835-5

T3 - Wissenschafts- und Technikgeschichte

SP - 517

EP - 546

BT - Genealogy of Popular Science

A2 - Morcillo, Jesus Munoz

A2 - Robertson-von Trotha, Caroline Y.

PB - transcript Verlag

CY - Bielefeld

ER -