Workshop: Metaphors in Science Communication with Sam

Overview of the workshop

Metaphors are more than sophisticated poetic embellishments – they shape our everyday lives in the way we speak, understand and act. A metaphor is a gateway between a known concept and a new dimension: it is this collision between disparate ideas that can transform confusion into comprehension. By looking at a complex problem or a new concept from unexpected angles and with different lenses metaphors help researchers to grasp the different facets of the challenge at hand. With this multi-facetted representation in mind, explaining the complexity of an idea becomes a lot easier.
 

While metaphors are essential elements of the science communication toolbox, they are always imperfect (“all metaphors leak”). Knowing a metaphor’s limitations is necessary to prevent the audience from being misled.
 

In this workshop, participants will explore the power of metaphors for understanding and
explaining complex ideas. Fun and playful exercises will act as an introduction to translational thinking and we will then create metaphors to represent, explain, and understand the scientific topics related to the participants research.