Make ’em laugh — a session all about comedy
During the first Virtual Conference of the MCAA which took place on the 6th and 7th of November 2020, and focussed on Research & Democracy, there was also some space for two comedy sessions: ‘Make ’em laugh — a science comedy workshop,’ and the MCAA classic ‘The Dark Side of Research,’ a science comedy show.
This post will clearly focus on the former — what a surprise, no?
During the first day of the conference, having listened to the Opening Session, the keynote lecture about Democracy, and a session focussed on Open science, it was necessary to lighten things up a bit, and what is better than a comedy workshop? Nothing! This is why Valerie Bentivegna, the chair of the Communication Workgroup of the MCAA, took the screen and presented her very own comedy workshop.
Valerie started the session with a comedy hip hop video about COVID-19 and scientists by Raven Baxter and she then asked a question:
“Why are we here in this workshop?”
We can say that there are probably two major reasons why someone might have joined the workshop:
1. Learning how to use science comedy as a way to do science communication;
2. Learning how to use some science comedy into our everyday scientific presentations;
3. Extra reason: logging into the session by mistake but finding it funny and thus keeping attending it.
At this point, Valerie explained why science comedy is important and described the several perks to science comedy: “It can show that science is not boring, it can make a scientist more relatable and memorable, and it can grab the audience’s attention.”
Science of course is not easy to explain, and it is true that sometimes it can be boring. For this reason, we (scientists) must find a way to make it more accessible, but also to make it enjoyable to the wider public, and this is where science comedy comes in handy: who doesn’t like to have a laugh? What’s better than having a laugh and learning something new at the same time?
At this point, we all agreed that science comedy is cool, no discussion about it. But how do you do it? How do you come up with new material for a “comedy set”?
Valerie, in a simple but effective way, explained:
“Draw from your own experience, if you’re open to experiencing new things, science is a huge inspiration for your work!”
She can’t be more right than that! We surely all have funny stories to tell from our lab experiments, office relationships, funny mistakes we have made, and so on… These are all elements that work perfectly as the base layer of our science comedy.
If you’re still not sure about which topics could work, or you’re struggling to come up with new materials, don’t worry, Valerie got you covered, here’s an exercise for you:
Writing down five ways to [insert prompt here]
A prompt could be: ‘convince your supervisor your data is not as awful as it looks,’ ‘completely ruin a zoom lab meeting,’ or ‘make an excuse for being late to the office,’ or you can always come up with your own!
If you’ve arrived at this point, you’ve decided what to talk about and you’re ready to write your comedy set/comedic talk. The only thing that is missing is that you have to make sure it is funny — I think this statement doesn’t really surprise you, but the real question is: how do you make it funny?
Once again, Valerie helped us out and explained to us the eight secrets of comedy — and you should consider yourself very lucky to be able to read them in the next couple of lines.
The secrets are (moment of suspense):
· Exaggeration: always remember that in comedy you have to magnify what happened to you, e.g. if in reality you slightly hurt your pinky toe, in science comedy you were about to die; or, this blog post will probably win a Pulitzer prize;
· Repetition: things have to be repeated throughout your talk/show: people tends to forget things;
· Elements of surprise: unexpected elements, unexpected ending are fundamentals to surprise people and make them laugh; e.g. you should know that humans have the same number of cervical vertebrae as a giraffe. But so does a mouse. And a kangaroo too!
· The rule of three: when giving out a list of things, the first one is something normal, the second one is something related to normal, but the third one is I like pizza so much! — yes, the third one is completely out of context, unexpected;
· Sarcasm: Oscar Wilde once stated: “Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit but the highest form of intelligence,” we couldn’t agree more: Use it!
· Embrace the pause: DoNotTalkTooFastPleaseTakeABreakAndBreathFromTimeToTime! Use pauses, moderate your voice, change your rhythm. All these elements will help to catch the audience’s attention;
· Repetition: things have to be repeated throughout your talk/show: people tends to forget things — I knew you had already forgotten this point, haven’t you?
Science Puns: ‘If you’re not part of the solution, you are part of the precipitate,’ I mean… They’re fun!
Now that you are aware of the eight (actually seven) secrets of comedy, you should also know that there is an extra rule that must not be forgotten:
“Break the rules and practice, practice and practice”
Practice includes:
· Write a rant: set a timer for 3 minutes and just write out everything you love/hate/are annoyed about, about a topic — this can help you get ideas for material;
· Try to tell your story in timed (1 min, then 30 seconds, and then 10 seconds): this will help you to focus on the real fun part of the story and figure out what your punchline is;
· Tell the story to someone and let them re-tell it to you;
For adding some humour into more traditional presentations, there are some things you can learn from comedy, such as:
· Learn to properly use a microphone (it is not a wand!) and use it — no, you don’t have a ‘deep voice,’ people sitting far away from you won’t hear you (extra note: even in virtual settings using a microphone and headset is very helpful, it will eliminate potential echo echo echo);
· Make your slides useful and use surprise elements: a well-placed meme or gif is always appreciated.
At this point, the audience members shared their best science jokes and puns, such as:
‘I have a joke about statistics, but I’m not sure it’s significant’
‘I have a joke about nanotechnology, but I’m afraid it’s too small’
‘I have a joke about coronavirus, but you’d have to wait 2 weeks to get it’
Having shared the best science puns that the world has ever seen (do you remember the exaggeration thing I mentioned before?), it was time to wrap up the session, and for this reason, Valerie answered some questions from the audience and shared a final thought:
“If you remember one thing, remember this: be likeable, be relatable, be okay with failing, be you, and most importantly: HAVE FUN!”
Ruben Riosa is an animal nutritionist currently working as a PhD student at the University of Bonn/University of Glasgow, where he is part of the MSCA ITN project MANNA. His project focuses on dairy cow’s nutrition and physiology. In the MANNA network, he is also the Scientific copywriter. He is deeply interested in science communication and loves to write.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rubenriosa/
Website: https://rubenriosa.com/
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