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    Houston, We Have a Narrative: Why Science Needs Story
    Unavailable
    Houston, We Have a Narrative: Why Science Needs Story
    Unavailable
    Houston, We Have a Narrative: Why Science Needs Story
    Ebook347 pages5 hours

    Houston, We Have a Narrative: Why Science Needs Story

    By Randy Olson

    4.5/5

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    About this ebook

     Ask a scientist about Hollywood, and you’ll probably get eye rolls. But ask someone in Hollywood about science, and they’ll see dollar signs: moviemakers know that science can be the source of great stories, with all the drama and action that blockbusters require.
     
    That’s a huge mistake, says Randy Olson: Hollywood has a lot to teach scientists about how to tell a story—and, ultimately, how to do science better. With Houston, We Have a Narrative, he lays out a stunningly simple method for turning the dull into the dramatic. Drawing on his unique background, which saw him leave his job as a working scientist to launch a career as a filmmaker, Olson first diagnoses the problem: When scientists tell us about their work, they pile one moment and one detail atop another moment and another detail—a stultifying procession of “and, and, and.” What we need instead is an understanding of the basic elements of story, the narrative structures that our brains are all but hardwired to look for—which Olson boils down, brilliantly, to “And, But, Therefore,” or ABT. At a stroke, the ABT approach introduces momentum (“And”), conflict (“But”), and resolution (“Therefore”)—the fundamental building blocks of story. As Olson has shown by leading countless workshops worldwide, when scientists’ eyes are opened to ABT, the effect is staggering: suddenly, they’re not just talking about their work—they’re telling stories about it. And audiences are captivated.
     
    Written with an uncommon verve and enthusiasm, and built on principles that are applicable to fields far beyond science, Houston, We Have a Narrative has the power to transform the way science is understood and appreciated, and ultimately how it’s done.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateSep 15, 2015
    ISBN9780226270982
    Author

    Randy Olson

    Randy Olson earned his Ph.D. at Harvard University and achieved tenure at the University of New Hampshire before resigning and moving to Hollywood, obtaining an M.F.A. from the University of Southern California School of Cinema, and embarking on a second career as a filmmaker. Since film school he has written and directed the critically acclaimed films Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus (Tribeca, '06, Showtime) and Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy (Outfest, '08), and co-founded The Shifting Baselines Ocean Media Project, a partnership between scientists and Hollywood to communicate the crisis facing our oceans.

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    Reviews for Houston, We Have a Narrative

    4.5/5

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    • 5/5
      When making a point most of us use stories that we think are effective, but many times the point gets lost so it is a wasted effort. Therefore reading this book will explain why that is as well as 3 or 4 well articulated processes that can be used now to fix it. The above was my first attempt to use the ABT talked about in the book.One caveat, while I think this is a must read it was a bit longer than I would have liked. That is why I gave it a 4.5 instead of a 5.