We’ve all had the experience where, excited by the prospect of gaining new information and expanding our minds on a topic of interest, we attended a lecture, a workshop, or a discussion group and immediately found ourselves lost. You probably double-checked the program description and—yep, right there in the description it says “an introduction” or “no prior knowledge needed.” The speaker genuinely wanted to share their information with an audience who is less familiar with the topic.  You genuinely wanted to learn about this topic. 

So, where did it all go wrong?

The problem lies in the fact that the speaker has lost sight of what is commonly understood language and concepts vs. what is specialized language and concepts specific to their field of study. We’ve all been there! As an academic, you’ve been trained over the last few years of your Ph.D. work to speak within the language of your field and subfield. It can now be challenging to identify when you’re communicating with jargon and when you’re not. 

I’m going to make an analogy here that you may find controversial—but hear me out before you disagree! Scholarly writing is basically fanfiction for the academic world.

[Image Description: Marshal Stacker Pentecost, from Pacific Rim, leans his elbow on the table and points his finger at the viewer while saying, “You, keep talking.”]

Pictured: You, tentatively intrigued by this odd analogy

Don’t be upset by that! Fanfiction is an amazing tool! Within different fandom communities, fanfiction allows a writer to build their writing skills while testing new ideas and narrative structures. The key thing about this exploration, however, is the fact that it’s taking place within a relatively specialized group of consumers who all understand and engage with the same base lexicon of source material.

This is where the overlap with academic writing is found. You, as an academic creating new knowledge, are also testing new ideas and narrative structures as you present your research findings. You are also doing this within a relatively specialized group of consumers (those in your field and subfield) who all understand and engage with the same base lexicon of source material (well-established theories, foundational texts, standard methodological approaches, et.). In the same way a consumer of fanfiction will understand what “40K AU Coffee Shop Slow Burn Destiel Fix-It Fic'' means, you can also be assured that the previous information was incomprehensible to the uninitiated.

[Image Description: Castiel, from Supernatural, gestures at the viewer with a half-eaten hamburger while he says, “Exactly!”]

Pictured: One of the uninitiated, agreeing with these points

Alright, you say, this is all well and good. Odd analogy, but I see your point—now what do I do about it?

So glad you asked.

1. Know your audience. While you might not always know who the totality of your audience will be, you can make some educated guesses. You can group your audience into three overall categories: Group 1: members of your subfield; Group 2: general members of your discipline, Group 3: general listeners. Each of these groups has progressively less familiarity with your topic. As a direct result, the shorthand terms of understanding and jargon you use should progressively decrease as well. Do not use the same terminology for each group. For example, consider the following sentence:

“The multi-sensory format of asynchronicity offers students a metacognitive level of introspection that is not always possible in a synchronous session.”

[Image Description: Brick Armstrong, from Insatiable, gesturing with his hand to emphasize his question as he asks, “What does that mean?”]

Pictured: How we all feel when we hear statements like the one above

Who is this sentence directed at? Likely Group 1, possibly Group 2, not at all Group 3. This sentence is a mouthful and requires a higher level of effort for your reader or listener to understand than it would if we’d phrased it without so much jargon.  Consider the alternative:

“Sessions that aren’t held in real-time let students reflect on their own learning process and engage with students through multiple senses, which isn’t always possible in a session taking place in real-time.”

 This sentence says the same thing as our first example, but with much more straightforward language. 

2. Define your terms. Sometimes you can only explain something with the use of a specific term or key theory. Going back to our original example—you likely don’t know what “Destiel'' is unless you are part of the specific fan community (again, think discipline) using that term. Similarly, unless you’re involved in education in some way, you likely haven’t heard the term “metacognitive” before. Both Destiel (a combination of the names Dean and Castiel) and metacognitive (thinking about one's learning process) can be swapped out for more common language that wider audiences will identify and understand, but what do you do when it’s not possible to swap out more common language for a term?

Define your term.

This sounds straightforward, but in order for you to be sure you’re tailoring your language for the audience group you may be presenting to, you will first need to do a little metacognitive introspection yourself. Can you remember when you first learned the terms you use when discussing your research? Do you recall what was confusing to you then verse now? If you are preparing to present your work to an audience comprised of Group 3, decide ahead of time which terms absolutely cannot be said another way, and then spend some time writing out definitions for those terms in more common language. Make sure you provide these definitions when you introduce the terms and then make sure you remind your audience of these definitions as needed throughout your discussion. 

[Image Description: Twyla, from Schitt's Creek, askes “Another one?”]

Pictured: Your audience, as you define another term

3.Have clear transitions between ideas. Transitions are important. They provide roadmaps for your listeners or readers to help them understand how you interpret the relationship between multiple pieces of information. Regardless of which audience group you are working with, clear transitions are the difference between a frustrated audience and an audience who will continue to follow along. Spend a bit of time before you share your work identifying where the rhetorical moves in your argument, your data analysis, or your statistical models become complicated. Ask yourself how transition words can act as signals to help your audience interpret the information you’re providing. Transition words can help illuminate the connection between seemingly disconnected topics for your audience by indicating relationships, such as causation, chronology, or contrasts. These small verbal cues make a world of difference.

4. Connect your research back to common, everyday contexts. Your research may be highly theoretical or highly complex lab work, but when you explain your research you will need to ground the research in a more every-day context. Again, you are working now to share the new knowledge you took part in creating beyond your field and subfield. You cannot use the same examples or explanations with Group 3 that you might with Group 1. Your goal, as a producer of knowledge, is to share that knowledge. Ground your work in an everyday context to help people understand both the importance of your work as well as the application.

Let’s go back to our discussion about metacognitive learning and asynchronous sessions. The speaker has already told us “sessions that aren’t held in real-time let students reflect on their own learning process and engages with students through multiple senses, which isn’t always possible in a session taking place in real-time.”  What does this mean on a practical level? Well, it means that when you give students a little more time to think about and reflect on their learning they can process information better. Students can then apply this greater understanding of their learning tasks. For example, let’s say you watch an episode of the Great British Baking Show. You see the contestants make shortbread cookies. You think you too would like to make shortbread cookies, but with a simple recipe because you know you haven’t made a cookie like this before. It takes you a day or two to find a recipe that looks doable but, in the end, you make delicious shortbread. This is because you did not have to bake something you were unfamiliar with the second you decided you wanted shortbread cookies (as if you were in a real-time, synchronous Bake Off session). Instead, you took time to think about what would be challenging in the recipe, plan for it, and then make the cookies (as if you were in a non-real-time, asynchronous Bake Off session).

[Image Description: Nadiya, from season 6 of The Great British Bake Off, pounding dough with a rolling pin.]

Pictured: You, working things out ahead of time. Look at that metacognition in action!

5. Have structure, create a narrative. People like structure. People like feeling as if the speaker knows why they are sharing information in a specific order rather than simply tossing information at them without rhyme or reason. We understand the world around us better when we can pin some kind of narrative structure to it. This holds true for sharing your research as well. When presenting your research to an audience who is unfamiliar with the topic, it can be helpful to keep narratives in mind. Start by clearly stating for your audience what your research question is. Follow this with an explanation of why your research question is important—what issue is it seeking to address? What greater understanding of ourselves or the human condition can your work provide? Follow with an explanation about how you’re seeking to answer this question and conclude with whatever results you have so far. This creates a kind of narrative arc for your audience that can be further enhanced by tying your work into a common or everyday context like we spoke about in the section above.

 6. Identify the key take-away. You’ve probably heard workshop speakers or guest lecturers share their information and found yourself wondering, “So what?” What is the point of the information being shared? What were you, as the audience member, meant to take-away from the talk? You can explain things in accessible language, define your terms as needed, connect things to their everyday context, and create a clear narrative about your work but if you don’t make the “so what” of your discussion clear, your audience still won’t get your point. Now, for Group 1, 2, and 3, how you explain your “so what” may shift a little—Group 1, for example, might be the group with whom you focus on the theoretical implications of your work; Group 3 might be the group with whom you focus on the potential social impact of your work. Either way, you as the facilitator need to know what you want your audience to take away from your discussion and you need to build to that larger take-away clearly and logically. Don’t spend the bulk of your time focusing on the cool new methodology you came up with and then conclude by focusing on a policy impact of your work that you haven’t even hinted at yet.

[Image Description: A young woman looks at the viewer, smiling widely, while lifting the lid off a gift box. Another young woman’s head pops out of the opened gift.]

Pictured: You, giving the gift of a clear take away message to your audiance

As an academic, you’ve been trained to speak and think about your research in a very particular way. You tested your ideas and presented your new knowledge to those within your field who can help you grow and refine your research, and you’ve done so using the language of your discipline. Now, like a fanfiction author taking their narrative skills to the wider public, it’s time for you to share your work with those outside your discipline—potentially outside of academia all together. Keep these tips in mind and you’ll audience will walk away informed and interested in the new knowledge you have produced.