Science Communication in South Africa : Reflections on Current Issues
Why do we need to communicate science? Is science, with its highly specialised language and its arcane methods, too distant to be understood by the public? Is it really possible for citizens to participate meaningfully in scientific research projects and debate? Should scientists be mandated to enga...
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African Minds
2019
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=4403735&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: nlebk uiTerm: 4403735 longDbName: eBook Collection (EBSCOhost) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: btl: Science Communication in South Africa : Reflections on Current Issues aug: au: Peter Weingart Marina Joubert Bankole Falade isbn: 9781928502036 9781928502043 imageinfo: pubinfo: dt: @attributes: year: 2019 month: 01 day: 01 dtAvail: @attributes: year: 2026 month: 03 day: 06 pub: African Minds pubContract: Thoth Open Metadata place: Cape Town price: 0.01 limitsGroup: maxCheckoutDays: 1500 pda: N printPagesOffline: 100 printPagesOnline: 100 previewPages: 10000 prePubGroup: dewey: @attributes: class: 501.4 item: 501 .4 lc: @attributes: class: Q223 .S354 2019 item: Q 223 .S354 2019 artinfo: ui: 4403735 1156833113 formats: fmt: @attributes: type: EB doid: NL$4403735$PDF caption: PDF download: Y tig: atl: Science Communication in South Africa : Reflections on Current Issues ptl: Science Communication in South Africa aug: au: Peter Weingart Marina Joubert Bankole Falade su: Communication in science--South Africa Communication in science sug: subj: SOCIAL SCIENCE / Cultural & Ethnic Studies / African Studies Communication in science--South Africa Communication in science ab: Why do we need to communicate science? Is science, with its highly specialised language and its arcane methods, too distant to be understood by the public? Is it really possible for citizens to participate meaningfully in scientific research projects and debate? Should scientists be mandated to engage with the public to facilitate better understanding of science? How can they best communicate their special knowledge to be intelligible? These and a plethora of related questions are being raised by researchers and politicians alike as they have become convinced that science and society need to draw nearer to one another. Once the persuasion took hold that science should open up to the public and these questions were raised, it became clear that coming up with satisfactory answers would be a complex challenge. The inaccessibility of scientific language and methods, due to ever increasing specialisation, is at the base of its very success. Thus, translating specialised knowledge to become understandable, interesting and relevant to various publics creates particular perils. This is exacerbated by the ongoing disruption of the public discourse through the digitisation of communication platforms. For example, the availability of medical knowledge on the internet and the immense opportunities to inform oneself about health risks via social media are undermined by the manipulable nature of this technology that does not allow its users to distinguish between credible content and misinformation. In countries around the world, scientists, policy-makers and the public have high hopes for science communication: that it may elevate its populations educationally, that it may raise the level of sound decision-making for people in their daily lives, and that it may contribute to innovation and economic well-being. This collection of current reflections gives an insight into the issues that have to be addressed by research to reach these noble goals, for South Africa and by South Africans in particular. pubtype: eBook doctype: Book ougenre: Book language: English copyright: @attributes: flag: N copyrightText: holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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