Many working scientists want to be part of the public conversation about science and its social implications. But writing for the public isn't something any graduate program trains us in. If we learn how to do it, it's on the side, partially by accident, and perhaps slightly in tension with the demands of our research careers.
I'm Jordan Ellenberg, one of those scientists who has accidentally learned how to write for a general audience, and have found it to be a really meaningful and valuable part of my scientific career, and in spring 2022 I'll be leading an online writers' workshop for early-career scientists who are interested in making writing for the public a part of their work.
Who should apply? Early-career scientists. I mean "science" broadly to include physical and biological sciences, engineering, computer science, math, quantitative social science, and probably some other things too. By "early-career" I mean Ph.D. students or people who are not currently in tenure-track academic positions. Since this will be fully virtual, you do not need to be in Wisconsin, or anywhere near Wisconsin. I do not mean to impose hard boundaries, so if you're not sure, apply!
When is this due? I would like to see all applications in by Friday, March 4. The application form is not onerous (no recommendations, the only "essay" is a writing sample and my intent is for you to use something you already have)
What will we talk about? To my mind, the main thing that makes good science writing good is that it's good writing. So we will talk a lot about what participants in any writers' workshop talk about -- thinking about a piece of writing as a series of conscious choices about sentences, words, sounds, even punctuation, each of which has stakes. We will also talk about things that are specific to science writing: questions about audience, questions about which subjects make good popular pieces, questions about how to deploy technical language. Finally, we'll talk some about the logistics of writing and publishing in the 21st century: how do you submit a piece to a publication? How does the editorial process work? How do you pitch a book proposal? Will writing for the public torch your scientific career? (No.)
What is the structure? We'll meet once a week for an hour, 3-4pm on Mondays central time, starting sometime in March. My plan is for there to be eight participants, so we'll do one introductory meeting and then eight more, one for each person. Each week, one participant will circulate a draft to the whole group; each participant (including me!) is expected to make detailed comments on the piece, and we'll devote most of the following week's session to discussing the piece in depth. The goal will be for everyone to come out of the workshop with a submission-ready piece of writing.
What length/format of piece will we be working on? My thought was that we would focus on the magazine/newspaper piece of roughly 1000 words, because I've written a ton of them myself, and they're the easiest thing to place, especially for writers without an existing portfolio. Short form also makes it less of a time-load for members to do line-by-line critique, a skill I really want us to build. If you are really not interested in short pieces, I am open to us working over a book pitch of a similar length.
Will this workshop have any official status, or be graded, or count for academic credit in any way? Hell, no, that's a level of logistical pain I can't even imagine taking on.
About me: I'm a math professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I've been writing for the public about mathematics ever since I was in graduate school. I've written for the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Slate, Wired, The Believer, and a bunch of other places, and I've published two books about math that were New York Times bestsellers (and one novel, which was decidedly not.) My article "Outward-facing mathematics: a pitch" gives some idea about how I think of the project of writing public science. My academic home page. My writing home page.
Acknowledgment: This project is partially supported by NSF grant DMS-2001200.