PARK HOWELL:  COMMENTS FOR 3.4

MIKE STRAUSS:  COMMENTS FOR 3.4

MPatterson: Was sharing this class with someone the other day… they thought the agreement section followed immedately by the turn (I love you all, but…) seemed a little patronizing. They prefer people to just get to the point, the conflict right away. Do you ever find that with the AND statements or is this just a matter of knowing your audience?

If your audience is larger than 2 it’s likely you are overestimating how much they are all on the same page as you. The Agreement piece can be brief but it is essential to being sure everyone starts with the same focus. Jumping right into the conflict makes me as reader/hearer decide without benefit of explanation if I really agree that it’s a conflict. So mentally rather than thinking along with you I may be internally arguing with you.

daeisenhauer: Climate seems like a really hard nut to crack when it comes to connecting with audiences and motivating positive action. Is it a narrative problem, or something else?

There is a lot of “baggage” when mentioning climate to a large audience. You need to find the place where all the audience can agree on. Years ago I did it this way: 1. Before the industrial revolution there was a lot of coal and oil stored underground. 2. But since then we have taken huge amounts of it out and thrown it into the atmosphere. 3. Therefore, we could reasonably guess that, in some way, things are different. Any reasonable person would agree to those but might not agree as to the degree of seriousness of the consequence…but it’s a step towards that place of agreement. It’s a narrative problem only in the sense that we too often start with “climate change is a serious problem”…which is starting with the conflict. If the person doesn’t believe that then it’s their cue that they don’t need to pay further attention. So start in an area of agreement.

Joanne Grady: I’m intrigued with how this applies in scientific journal articles as they have specific guidelines and expectations?? I see it more for how we communicate with public and others about our work.

Joanne, did you watch the AAAS video? It addresses precisely this point. Very important. A journal article is a perfect vehicle for narrative.

RANDY OLSON:  COMMENTS FOR 2.9

RANDY OLSON:  COMMENTS FOR 3.1

CHRISTINA LUHN & DIANNA PADILLA: Reply to Question From Two Women

In a previous session, this question was posed in the chat log:

Marlis Douglas and Ilsa Kuffner:
Any advice on how women should pitch the “BUT” controversy – they generally are perceived much more negatively using the same approaches as male counterparts in politics or science (e.g., self-deprecating interpreted as ‘humble’ in men versus ‘incompetent’ in women)

I decided to defer to our experts for their answers.  Here is the answer of Dianna Padilla (who joined us for the session on the ABT in Science).   To view the reply of Christina Luhn (who joined us for the session on the ABT in Politics) click here.
 

DIANNA PADILLA (Professor of Evolutionary Biology)
 

DIANNA: In academia and in science in general:

Bias regarding women is pervasive – both by men and by women
We have seen very little if any change through time, even though women make up an increasing proportion of scientists (but decreasing proportions toward the top that has not changed in the last 30 years)
There is an ever growing body of research showing the impact of implicit bias against women (and minorities) in science in general, everything from ratings on grants, reviewing peer reviewed publications, as well as hiring and promotion. Both women and men have implicit bias against women and minorities.
But, it has also been shown that implicit bias is reduced when both men and women are reminded that it clouds our perceptions, but this effect fades through time. Therefore, agencies like NSF now frequently have implicit bias training before every review panel. Both men and women need to be aware – then maybe we can change things.

What to do?
Don’t be surprised by it or caught off guard by it. If you are emotionally prepared it is easier to deal with. And when it does not happen you can be delightfully surprised

In communication – Things you can train yourself to do
Avoid “um” – this is a spacer your mouth uses while your brain catches up. Try pausing until you get the right word rather than saying um. No one notices that extra little pause, but they do notice the um. Up makes one sound unconvincing, or unsure of what one is saying.

Something many women do is raise the tone of their voice at the end of a sentence (as one does when asking a question). Many women do this. Again, it makes one sound less convinced of what one is saying.

The “but” is less often considered a weakness or negative if it is immediately followed by a solution – that is where “therefore” comes in.

Practice so you are comfortable talking in front of people. Reread and rewrite your written communication to make sure it is the best it can be. Read written work out loud – our ears are better editors than our eyes. Get feedback from colleagues on written communications and oral presentations.

Is this fair? Absolutely not. Will it change in the future? We can only hope and, like racism, we all have to work to try to make change happen.

When I was an Assistant Professor a friend gave me a button that said “To succeed women have to be 25% better than men. Thankfully, it is not that hard”.

CHRISTINA LUHN & DIANNA PADILLA: Reply to Question From Two Women

RANDY OLSON: SESSION 2.7: “The ABT in Science”

RANDY OLSON: SESSION 2.6: “The ABT in Entertainment”

RANDY OLSON: SESSION 2.5: “The ABT in Politics”

SWING LEFT VIDEO

Here’s the video SwingLeft.org did on the ABT in 2018, produced by Aaron Huertas.

CORONAVIRUS COMMERCIALS

And here’s the video that’s a compilation of pieces of commercials in the pandemic era.

WHO IS THE HERO?

Lianne Allen-Jacobson to everyone:
Question from a scientist: I love Park’s advice about making your customer your hero. But, I’m not sure who my customer is! (maybe this is part of my problem). If I’m writing a paper about coral physiology, is my customer the coral? the coral scientist? the taxpayer that funded my research?

It’s probably the coral reef research/conservation community. Dianna Padilla will address this in her presentation.

TIME FOR THE NICHOLAS KRISTOF ARTICLE

Barbara Little:
I’ve heard too that one person’s death is a tragedy but 1000 people’s deaths is a statistic

This is one of the greatest short articles on realities of communicating an issue to the public. I hereby beg all of you to read it and re-read it frequently. It’s really tremendous — simple, short and practical.

https://www.outsideonline.com/1909636/nicholas-kristofs-advice-saving-world

SPEECHWRITERS AND NARRATIVE

Darryl Finnigan:
Do speechwriters take any narrative training? Is it that they major in comms/English? Or are there more training avenies for them?

As far as I can tell, this is a huge problem in the political world — that most of them have ZILCH training and understanding of narrative. You heard me tell my story about James Carville and the Hillary Clinton campaign. When I was in the middle of that effort, a friend told me to watch Episode 3 of Season 3 of Veep. You can read the summary of it here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Veep_episodes#Season_3_(2014)

In that episode Selina (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) announces her candidacy for president. There’s scenes of her speech writers who have a big board full of different color Post-it notes — each color for a different writer. As one writer convinces her to add one of his bits, he runs to the board, takes down someone else’s colored note and replaces it with his.

When I was trying to work with the young guy on Hillary’s team I told him about that scene and asked him if it was similar to their process. He said, “You’re not far off with that.”

Most of the speechwriters tend to be history or political science majors. They know all about politics, but nuttin’ about narrative. Which is the problem.

“STORY” VERSUS “NARRATIVE”

Evelyn Wight:
Good distinction today between story and narrative – is there anything further we can read on this?

Yes! Here’s my definition essay on the issue, from the end of last year’s, “Narrative is Everything” book.

APPENDIX 1 – Defining “Story” Versus Narrative

In 2011, my improv-instructor buddy Brian Palermo began making a bit of a noodge of himself in our workshops. I would use the words “story” and “narrative” liberally. He finally asked, “What’s the difference?”

I scoffed, obfuscated (the very thing I complained about in this book’s Introduction) and said, “You can’t separate them.” I told him the terms are too broad and all-encompassing to parse. He said bullshit.

We had that exchange enough times that I began to think about what he was saying. He was right. I was being lazy. So I put the same question to a senior communications professor at USC who had been a huge help over the years. He scoffed, obfuscated and dismissed me, saying, “You can’t separate them.” I wanted to say bullshit, but was a little more polite.

By 2014, I had figured out what I feel is an effective set of working definitions for the two terms which I presented in Houston, We Have a Narrative. It’s now five years later. I not only stick with the definitions, I also think they are important, and that most people using these terms are just being lazy in not thinking this through.

We live in an information-overburdened world now. We know that narrative structure is at the core of what we have to say. But you can sense the two words are not identical just by how people respond to them. Story has a sense of human warmth to it, while narrative is more cold and analytical.

So here are my analytical definitions of the two.

THE MONOMYTH-BASED DEFINITIONS

Famed mythologist Joseph Campbell did a comparative study of storytelling among the various religions and cultures of the world and found that their stories follow a basic form, which he called “the monomyth.”

JOSEPH CAMPBELL’S MONOMYTH MODEL FOR A STORY. A “story” is this entire diagram. “Narrative” refers to just the bottom half— the problem-solution part of the journey—which is the driving force of a story .

He defined the structure of a story as a circular journey that begins and ends at the same place. Along the way, it passes through three phases:

RANDY OLSON: SESSION 2.4: “The ABT in Business”

THE ADVERTISING VIDEO

Here’s an article that presents the the advertising video I showed. What’s funny to notice is that the text of the article makes no mention of the three forces at work. Which just shows you how the average person, even when handed something like this, sees CONTENT way more than FORM.

https://adage.com/creativity/work/microsoft-sam-every-covid-19-commercial-exactly-same/2251551

THE THREE FORCES AT WORK

David made this interesting comment:

David Goldstein:
Story of ME, story of US, Story of What Will Be….

On Friday, Aaron Huertas made a mention of how strategists in the Democratic party are fans of Marshall Ganz and his “Public Narrative” concept, which is presented here:

https://workingnarratives.org/article/public-narrative/

Ganz talks about there being 3 stories: the story of self, the story of us, the story of now.

Which is nice, but I gotta be honest — I don’t get it. We know there are three fundamental forces of narrative — agreement, contradiction, consequence. The realization of this didn’t begin with Marshall Ganz — it began in the 1700’s with the great philosophers and what they called “The Triad” (or the Dialectic) of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thesis,_antithesis,_synthesis

It’s the same three forces. Neurophysiology research now shows it’s how the brain is programmed.

But what Ganz presents is basically BTA instead of ABT.

He’s starting with the BUT in starting with the story of self. Think of Jerry Graff’s book, “They Say, I Say.” Notice the second part is the story of self — as in “here’s what I say.”

Then he progresses to the story of unity or synthesis with the story of us, which unifies everything. Then lastly he ends with the story of now, which sounds to me like the “They Say” element.

All of which says to me that it’s a strategy for polarization in society. But maybe that’s just me.

PARK HOWELL’S SPIRAL

Anu: Interesting that this model is a spiral vs. Campbell’s circle. Maybe I missed that, but why spiral vs. circle?

Joseph Campbell’s “Monomyth” model is a circle where the hero eventually returns to the starting point, but is “wiser” as the Winkler video said.

Park’s spiral is the same journey, but by being a spiral it shows visually that things are “a level up” when the hero returns to the starting point.

You can learn more about it by ordering his new book!

LINK TO PARK’S BOOK:

https://www.amazon.com/Brand-Bewitchery-System-Spellbinding-Stories/dp/1734308117

TELL YOUR OWN STORY

David Goldstein:
If you do not lead with a story then the audience will lead with a story that you did not intend!

Yes, exactly. Next Wednesday for our final session we’re going to have as our special guest, my friend Dr. Shirley Malcom

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirley_M._Malcom

A couple years ago I included this bit in the new content I added to the 2nd edition of my first book, “Don’t Be Such A Scientist.”

Shirley’s Law: If you don’t tell your own story, someone else will tell it for you (and you probably won’t like what they say).

She had said the same thing to me for years — you better tell your own story or someone else will. This became sadly true with Hillary Clinton as Trump began to label her as Crooked Hillary.

REPETITION, REPETITION, REPETITION

Evelyn Wight to everyone: I just want to say how helpful it is to hear some of this again – I am taking the course this second time and feel like I am “getting” some of this MUCH better now.

YAY, EVELYN! You said exactly what the folks on our ABT Framework Team keep saying. They’ve heard all this stuff for 5 years at least, yet still find it valuable to hear again. And even the same for me — I find it valuable to hear myself telling it all again. It just takes a lifetime to completely soak in.

Really appreciate your saying this — thanks.

RANDY OLSON: SESSION 2.3: “Therefore”

Great session, everyone be sure to visit the Google Group now — the first 4 Working Circles have been posted.

Here’s a few questions and answers.

Elizabeth L Mclean: Do people/students that study the art of argumentation, doing oral speech and debates, follow a narrative framework?

Yes, absolutely. You’ve heard me mention the best starting point for this — Jerry Graff’s book, “They Say, I Say,” which has sold over 2 million copies. Everyone should own a copy. The parallels with this course are 100% and he’s my good buddy for the past 15 years — great guy!

https://www.amazon.com/They-Say-Matter-Academic-Writing/dp/1469028611

David Goldstein: For World Bank the question should be how many authors are English first language speakers now vs. then…

That’s certainly an interesting aspect of it and probably a factor in the change over time, but the important point is simply comparing today’s 5% not to the values in the 1940’s, but rather to well edited material that scores around 2.5%. It baffles me that there exists this simple, objective criteria that points out poor communication, yet is not used, and was even ridiculed.

Julie Claussen: Are journalist taught the AND frequency, or is it more intuitive for editors that 2.5% makes a more interesting story?

Do you know any journalists or editors? If so, ask them if they have ANY idea of this 2.5% value. I don’t think they do. I’ve never met anyone who has known of it, but as I said, the World Bank study cited it, then when we measured it for well edited magazine articles it was amazingly consistent. I don’t think it occurs analytically — I think it is a byproduct of a mind that has good narrative intuition.

Elizabeth L Mclean: the irony of our times… a colleague of mine wrote a report entitled “lesson learned from lessons learned”… implying that what is learned is not actually put into practice 😛

That’s a perfect title. When I made my movie “Flock of Dodos,” I went to the Tribeca Film Festival ready to give it a good premiere, be done with it, and immediately start my next movie. Little did I know I would spend the next two years doing over 200 screenings with over 100 post-screening discussions that I took part in. But that turned out to be the most important part of the process. For the most part, things do not “speak for themselves.” They only speak with someone obnoxious like me goes out and shouts at people that, “THIS THING IS IMPORTANT!!!”

Which is exactly the story for that World Bank study. I think it was important, but unless someone like me beats a drum around it, it will be lost to history.

This was exactly the deal with my editorial about Michael Crichton in January. He is already almost completely forgotten, but there is … (wait for it) a lesson to be learned. I wrote this article, teaching the lesson of the missed opportunity. And of course it came out, had one day on Twitter of the climate crowd telling me to shut up and quit promoting a climate skeptic, then the next day the climate skeptics all told me to shut up and quit promoting climate action, and then it was all done.

Ah, what a lovely society we’ve created.

https://ensia.com/voices/climate-communication-michael-crichton-darth-vader/

dmarkbreiter: Does the analysis of “and” over time take into account other ways of connecting clauses/phrases (such as commas or semicolons)? It seems like that analysis might’ve just pointed towards shifts in English stylistics rather than narrative form

For the World Bank study they only measured the proliferation of the one word, but they also included qualitative validation, like showing samples of the text showing how these days the word is used to string together disconnected subjects, on and on and on. The metric itself (frequency of “and”) may not be that precise, but the sample size is huge, meaning the pattern is definitely real.

Evelyn Wight: How does narrative work across political beliefs? No matter how good trump is at narrative, it doesn’t reach me. Is there a study about the role of ABT/narrative to influence opinion – seems like it could only work with ‘undecided’ – it can’t sway opinion if your mind is made up. Or can it?

The core principle is at the simplest of levels — that people do not follow leaders who bore or confuse. Trump never bored or confused his followers. His messaging, albeit bombastic, was always simple, clear and focused. The bulk of the Democrats lack that ability, and thus lack effective leadership.

Ilsa Kuffner: Randy can you please provide a copy of your Scientific American article? Would love to read it. Thanks

Hi Ilsa – here you go: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/a-new-tool-for-humanizing-medicine/

Dean Pentcheff: There is some work I’ve read about that indicates that it’s hugely difficult to change opinions. Tune them, yes, moderate them, yes. But flip them? Almost never. (Which shouldn’t stop us trying!)

Do you think Coca Cola ever manages to change opinions about their product or is their annual budget of $200 million a waste?

RANDY OLSON: SESSION 2.2: “But” – Overall Thoughts
 

Stacy Levy had this awesome comment near the end of the session, “Like therapy, the chat gets most intersting in the last few minutes of the session. ”

That is a combination of true, hilarious and profound! The best questions come at the end. Here’s a few replies.

Julie Claussen: Randy – it would be good to spend a bit of time talking about DHY

Julie, you’re in the Platinum Club, so I know you’ve got a pretty good feel for DHY. Which means I guess you’re asking about it for the benefit of the new folks, which is nice. But for starters, everyone should already have some rough idea from the AAAS video. If you haven’t viewed it, it’s time to right now:

In the simplest (and borderline disparaging) terms, DHY means basically “pretzel brained.” It means you have multiple narratives going at once which, if done skillfully, is the essence of lots of great art. Some of the best murder mysteries have several narrative threads going at once. And if they are done well, all the threads eventually resolves themselves and it becomes a satisfying experience.

BUT … when it’s done in conversation and the person speaking heads off in five directions and never resolves any of them … it’s just plain confusing. Which is what you get from academics sometimes. And thus this silly figure in the AAAS video …

 
 
THE CHRISTMAS TREE

Oops. Ed Lozano — thanks for doing your best to explain the Christmas tree to Barbara in the chat. You made me realize this could be a recurring problem — my forgetting I presented it in Round 1, but not yet in Round 2.

What Ed was referring to is this great bit in this great article by longtime Democratic party strategist Dave Gold (who spoke to us in the last session of the 1st Round). This is a really, really helpful thought to have in your head in working towards the single narrative (which we will discuss on Wednesday).

Years ago, my political mentor taught me the problem with this approach, using a memorable metaphor: issues are to a campaign message what ornaments are to a Christmas tree, he said. Ornaments make the tree more festive, but without the tree, you don’t have a Christmas tree, no matter how many ornaments you have or how beautiful they are. Issues can advance the campaign’s story, but without a narrative frame, your campaign doesn’t have a message, no matter how many issue ads or position papers it puts forward.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/02/data-driven-campaigns-democrats-need-message-214759
 
 
THE “IS RONAN FARROW TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE” ARTICLE IN NY TIMES

Here’s the article I talked about.

Yui Takeshita had this great question: To write a concise ABT, you need to omit details by definition. So by telling a compelling story, you will always be criticized for being ‘dishonest’, or not telling the whole story. so how do you navigate this dilemma?

Let me start by talking about this issue for scientists. They are the ones who routinely and mistakenly see themselves as the arbiters of “the truth.” But they, along with all other humans, face this endless dilemma of basically having to use the ABT to communicate the AAA because it’s more effective.

In 1964 Nobel Laureate P.B. Medawar delivered a talk titled, “Is the Scientific Paper a Fraud?” You can read it here: http://www.weizmann.ac.il/mcb/UriAlon/sites/mcb.UriAlon/files/uploads/medawar.pdf

What he was agonizing over was the fact that you do a bunch of research, but no journal will allow you to publish all of it. Which means you face this same subjective process that Ronan Farrow is being dinged about. You have to choose what to include and what to leave out.

I’ve been at scientific talks where someone asks the investigator whether they measured a specific element. The speaker says yes, and the whole audience groans, “Well why didn’t you tell us about it???” Meaning that the entire talk would have different significance if that bit were included. The group knew it, the single individual didn’t. THIS is a major part of why we do Story CIRCLES (not Story Solos).

Seriously. It’s the eternal subjective element. There’s no getting around it. You just have to develop a good set of ethics, and then accept that sometimes if you tell the truth or paint an accurate picture of the world, you won’t reach as many people, but that’s no reason to not tell the truth and paint an accurate picture. The question is whether you can find the ABT form for it rather than just giving up and going with AAA.

I know the pain of this all too well. In 2006 I premiered my feature documentary “Flock of Dodos” at the Tribeca Film Festival. Alongside us, in the next theater over, was the premiere of a movie titled, “Jesus Camp.”

My movie was interesting, quirky, fun, crowd pleasing, but was not the shocking, anger-filled anti-right wing polemic that “Jesus Camp” was. Their movie was vastly dishonest, painting a portrait of supposed religious indoctrination of teens in Missouri that one critic referred to as “Bush’s Brown Shirt” (a reference to one of Hitler’s youth programs).

I grew up in Kansas. I went to religious gatherings in junior high where I watched my friends cry for Jesus (afraid I never managed it myself). They all grew up to be healthy adults. It was just a phase. I watched their movie in disbelief. I was complete distortion.

Their movie got theatrical distribution and was nominated for an Oscar. My movie ended up on Showtime but never made it to theaters, and thus didn’t earn nearly as much money.

My movie had strong ABT dynamics, which helped it reach a national audience on Showtime, but overall didn’t have as strong of a singular narrative. My story was, “Who is the flock of dodos — the creationists or the scientists?” It criticized both sides equally (which angered A LOT of scientists — the Smithsonian canceled an entire screening due to the protests of their scientists who hated being criticized). The message of “Jesus Camp,” was, “The right wing is evil.”

Remember that Frank Daniel quote I mentioned, “Your story is only as good as your villain is evil.” They went with that. This recent article about “Jesus Camp” shows what a piece of junk it was. I really hate dishonesty, especially from my side of the political spectrum. https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/jul/06/jesus-camp-christian-documentary-kids-10-years-later
 
 
THE “IF/THEN” CLAUSE

Ed Lozano : @Anu, If/Then, as I understand it, is using If/Then in the A section to put the argeement into context… When”And” is not enough…

Ed Lozano, thank you again. This was Ed, a second time, trying to fill everyone in on what I thought I’d already mentioned to this group but had not.

What he’s talking about is the use of “IF/THEN” logic for ideas you’re proposing. We want to know, “Why is this important?” This is one way to approach that question — to say, “IF we do this, THEN we’ll be able to …”

Or you can use it in the negative direction, “IF we don’t do this, THEN the following is going to happen …”

We’ve only recently stumbled upon the power of using it at times in an ABT. You’ll hear me bring it up some more.
 
 
STEREOTYPES

Evelyn Wight said: in the real world, almost nothing is really black or white/good or evil and boiling it down to that is problematic.

This is true, but what you have to add on to it is, “… BUT the mass audience wants things to be simple and singular — they don’t want nuance (intellectuals do).”

This then selects for stereotypes. Which is what our current president knows at a very deep level, and why he uses his single label insult names for his opponents like Crooked Hillary, Lyin’ Ted, and Low Energy Jeb. And it’s not just a handful of these labels. Look at this entire Wikipedia page for it — just scroll down it and take in the enormity of it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nicknames_used_by_Donald_Trump

This is yet another disappointment of the Democratic party — that they aren’t able to make the connection between this behavior and flat out racism. There are racial stereotypes that are not tolerated at all, yet he is allowed to do this same sort of denigration, most of which is just laughed at. It’s the same thing.
 
 
GREAT ART IS AAA

Albertha Joseph-Alexander asked: Can AAA evoke an emotion that is sustained and engaging?

Yes. AAA is central to great art. I think boredom plays a key role in the pathway to deep emotion. By the way, you do all know that people don’t experience emotion nearly as deeply today as they once did, right? Our short attention span, brought on by the Information Age, combined with our brains slowly figure out ways to avoid pain. One prime example is mourning.

People used to grieve and mourn and suffer the pain of the loss of loved ones for weeks, months, years, entire lifetimes. Today funerals are mostly designed to be celebrations of life where everyone is happy and gets over things as quickly as possible to “move on.” Which is fine, but it comes with a side effect which is simply not feeling things as deeply. Next!

Try reading some of the greatest novels ever written — Tolstoy, Harper Lee, Fitzgerald, Dostoyevsky, Cervantes, Melville — they all have loooooong stretches of AAA, but there’s something going on where it’s digging deeper and deeper into your psyche so that when it finally does get to the ABT parts, the impact is deeper.

I think. But then what do I know, I’m a former scientist.
 
 
POLARIZATION

Ilsa said: Yes our polarized culture right now is hugely disturbing to me. Interesting idea, that the glut of information resutling from so many media platforms is selecting for polarized stories.

This was a pattern that emerged in the 1990’s as the Information Explosion of the 1980’s began to really settle in. Almost every city that previously had two or more competing newspapers that previously were just several options for the impartial news suddenly underwent polarization. One or more newspaper moved to the right, the others moved left and we ended up with situations like MSNBC versus FOX for television news.

There is so much about society today that was easy to predict if you were able to view things in terms of information overload. A great book early on that had a big impact on me was this:

https://www.amazon.com/Economics-Attention-Style-Substance-Information/dp/0226468674

It was a brilliant book and (like so many other authors) I stalked the author and ended up having lunch with him. I was under the impression that his book had a big impact, but nope. He explained that he was an English Literature professor. The book was about communication. Nobody in the world of communication viewed him as a voice worth listening to. Such is the role of social dynamics in forming our overall knowledge. Often the information itself doesn’t matter. It’s how you’re perceived.
 
 
LUMBERJACKS AND GOLF

And finally, in typical form, the funniest comments of the session go to Evelyn and Dean …

Evelyn Wight:
For some reason the lumberjacks made me think of golf – how can anyone watch golf on TV? Those who do are in the “in” crowd. To make it, or the lumberjacks, interesting I would need at least a character to follow.

Dean Pentcheff:
You don’t personally identify with the little white ball, always being struck away from its friends?

Tax-free dju.dlbl.storycirclestraining.com.fvb.lo cytological there, [URL=https://www.globeclimbing.com/produit/perfect-descent-auto-belay-gate/?unapproved=297&moderation-hash=80f092a628ad1cd4e697ba92a1aa3ab9]stimulating,[/URL] emerge https://www.globeclimbing.com/produit/perfect-descent-auto-belay-gate/?unapproved=297&moderation-hash=80f092a628ad1cd4e697ba92a1aa3ab9 stimulating, [URL=https://www.herbio.ro/ro/termek/amestec-uleiuri-esentiale-respiratie-usoara/?unapproved=182&moderation-hash=28a270512c6d7b5c123dd044a4b6483f]angiogram[/URL] influencing https://www.herbio.ro/ro/termek/amestec-uleiuri-esentiale-respiratie-usoara/?unapproved=182&moderation-hash=28a270512c6d7b5c123dd044a4b6483f influencing [URL=https://buchwalds.dk/butik/ristet-kaffe/burundi-kayanza/?unapproved=16904&moderation-hash=a1e1b6881354ab872b0c065c5c218fd7]intramural[/URL] intramural https://buchwalds.dk/butik/ristet-kaffe/burundi-kayanza/?unapproved=16904&moderation-hash=a1e1b6881354ab872b0c065c5c218fd7 does, [URL=https://www.kingofdeal.com/product/dell-inspiron-15-6-5570-i5-8250-3-40ghz-8gb-256gb-ssd-windows-10/?unapproved=3122&moderation-hash=5d98c8f0b998d7534b195cc85af713b0]uterus:[/URL] metastasizing https://www.kingofdeal.com/product/dell-inspiron-15-6-5570-i5-8250-3-40ghz-8gb-256gb-ssd-windows-10/?unapproved=3122&moderation-hash=5d98c8f0b998d7534b195cc85af713b0 myelofibrosis, [URL=https://www.spinergo.com/hr/produkt/stolica-spinergo-music/?unapproved=231&moderation-hash=01758fe4e5ee37785594b0a15c255b6f]predispositions[/URL] myotonias https://www.spinergo.com/hr/produkt/stolica-spinergo-music/?unapproved=231&moderation-hash=01758fe4e5ee37785594b0a15c255b6f opening; social.

Download the chat log for Session 2.2 here.

Hey folks, here’s the chat logs for the entire round.

1 INTRO: AND (Agreement)

2 INTRO: BUT (Contradiction)

3 INTRO: THEREFORE (Consequence)

4 The ABT in Business

5 The ABT in Politics

6 The ABT in Entertainment

7 The ABT in Science

8 The ABT in Medicine

9 Narrative Selection

10 Narrative is Everything

For me, I experienced the first spike in confidence when I read Houston, We Have a Narrative. I could see ABT everywhere and thought I was ready to use it like a pro, but then after the NPS demo day and starting a Story Circle I realized that I did not know as much as I thought I did. Only after working through 10 sessions of a Circle did my collapse in confidence start to increase and actually match my competence with this stuff.

Anyway THEREFORE everyone in the course should take it again and/or do Story Circles if they really want to master the ABT.

Evelyn: @VKOLLMAR – re the coke ad, reminds me of a book I read years ago called ‘subliminal advertising’ 

Read a book on that many years ago (probably the same one you read)…it’s a thing but the writer of that particular book seemed to make it into a huge conspiracy theory…it’s basic marketing…

Evelyn: Some things blow up even if they have horrible messaging/structure:  Plandemic……

Sometimes the full narrative doesn’t need to be elaborated but plays off people’s internal agendas. In that way Plandemic plays off the unstated narrative of “Everyone is acting like the Coronaviruses took the world by surprise but it was really part of a secret plan.” So, in fact, it’s pretty good messaging…if you are predisposed to the underlying narrative.

Allyson: Question: I still don’t think I understand what you mean about the difference between story and narrative. 

Narrative is a structure for organizing the material. It can be a story and actually underlies good stories. I’m sure Randy has more to say on this so will leave the rest to him.

Robert: BUT it is hard to put into effect. I get the most positive feedback from people who are already sympathetic to what I am trying to say.

So turning this around a bit you are saying that those who are sympathetic are closer to your inner group so you don’t need to answer the “Why should I care?” issue.

In my presentation did a lot of criticizing of the IPCC “Summary for Policymaker” section — specifically the articles by Sterman (2008) in Science and Tollefson (2015) in Nature.  But here was something nice in 2018 — a section added to the Climate Outreach Handbook for IPCC Authors that presented the basics of the ABT Template:

https://climateoutreach.org/download/13492/

Here’s a few answer to questions:

CHRISTINA DORADO: You have said that you need at least 500 characters for good narrative structure but I am pretty sure we should not be trying to use ABT every 500 characters. Do you have any guidance on how and when to start to elongate the A, the B and the T for example in a scientific article?

Hi Christina –  I’ve been meaning to get to this.  People often ask how do we use the ABT structure beyond a single paragraph, which I think is what you’re pointing to with the word “elongate.”

I don’t have any immediate great examples from the science world (on the whole, science folks just aren’t that great at communication), but here’s one from the political world.  In 2018 Oprah Winfrey gave a tremendous speech at the Golden Globe Awards that overnight was hailed as a masterpiece.

A friend sent me the transcript, I did my usual narrative nerd thing of breaking it down in terms of the powers at work.  When you step and look at it you see the basic pattern of repeating ABT’s.  She had an overall ABT, and then smaller scale ABT’s within it.

I did a blogpost that showed my narrative nerd side in calling it “nested ABT’s.”   The next day the New York Times showed the difference between us by calling it, “a story made of stories.”  Which made me want to say, “Um … yeah, what they said.”

And that’s what you ultimately want — to tell an over-arching story that is made up of smaller scale stories.  That’s the dream scenario.

Here was my detailed analysis of it:  http://scienceneedsstory.com/2018/01/08/125-oprah-gives-an-abt-tour-de-force/

ELIZABETH STULBERG: I think the If/Then idea is powerful, especially in science writing. I’ve been trying to incorporate it into my writing for the last week or so, but I can’t square the IF in my ABTs with the BUT because then where does the THEN go?

Hi Elizabeth –  As I’ve mentioned, it’s only about 6 weeks since Marissa Metz and I stumbled upon the potential power of the IF/THEN clause, so we’re still trying to figure it out ourselves.  But what I’ve encountered so far is that it sometimes works best in the “A” part of the ABT, but then sometimes works better in the “B” part.

For example, “We’re working on this system and IF we can figure out X THEN we’ll be able to do Y, BUT so far …”

Or, “We’re working on this system and it’s really important, BUT we can’t get it to work and IF we don’t by the end of the year THEN we’re going to lose our funding, THEREFORE …”

Lots of possibilities I think.

MARISSA METZ:   There’s been a lot of emphasis on increasing our but/and ratio, but at what point does our work tip from a good amount of buts to DHY?

Hi Marissa, great and logical question.  I think your overall goal is exactly this — to have the maximum number of BUTs without slipping into DHY land.   This is presumably where a good editor comes in.  There’s only a handful of speeches I’ve found that score over 30.  Every one of them is powerful and memorable.  But I bet every one of them also had a good editor.

And by the way, look at the other end of the spectrum.  President George W. Bush gave 7 State of the Union speeches.  His scores for them were (honest to goodness): 4, 2, 3, 4, 5, 4, 4.   How in the world does a guy manage to do that.  Year after year, almost never using the word “but.”  And never speaking a single memorable word, other than, “They misunderestimated me” (I used to have a refrigerator magnet of him saying that).

EVELYN WRIGHT:  Is that paper available online to read?  (THE IMRAD PAPER)

Evelyn!  So glad you asked!  Yes, here it is — have fun reading it!

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC442179/

MOLLY LOCKHART:  The ABT narrative format is more effective than the boring AAA format. However, in your experience, are there repercussions to avoiding the “expected” AAA format when communicating with traditional academics? Essentially: is it risky for an early-career scientist to “challenge the status quo” and use ABT format in scenarios where peer review/funding depends on it?

MARISSA METZ:  Molly-I’ve been wondering the same thing. Seems that you can count on an “inner circle” much more during a paper review, but less so during, say a defense.

Hi Molly and Marissa –  This is a fairly painful question.  Mike Strauss and Rick Nelson can both tell you tales of this — of higher level program directors being suspicious of ABT style communication.  But this is really their problem/flaw/shortcoming.  Every scientist should know about Nobel Laureate P.B. Medawar’s famous essay in the 1960’s where he asked, “Is the scientific paper a fraud?”  He was addressing this problem directly.  Here’s a good essay on it:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4210093/

LIANNE ALLEN-JACOBSON:  Question/Comment for Randy: My favorite movies are really convoluted- they are often puzzles that switch between times/point of views. I also tend to write with DHY. I wonder if you surveyed scientists (or writers in general) if you would see a correlation between movie prefrence and writing style?

Hi Lianne (and Marky Mark Patterson) –  For starters, a couple years ago I had lunch with Dave Roberts who is a great and very smart writer for the online publication Vox.  He was a philosophy major.  I explained to him the Narrative Spectrum.  He immediately pointed to DHY and said, “That’s me.”

Which is what you get with very cerebral folks — both the tendency to think/communicate with DHY, but also to be drawn to that sort of communication. But the goal is to be “bilingual.”  To be able to do both.  I’m not certain anyone can, but it’s at least worth striving for.

ALBERTHA JOSEPH-ALEXANDER: Randy – Can the ABT narrative then be incorporated within the larger IMRAD in terms of the clarity of how the results/ discussions are presented?

JULIE CLAUSSEN:  Randy to clarify – You use ABT structure within the IMRAD template for Introduction and Discussion?

Albertha and Julie –  I like to say ABT stands for “Always Be Telling stories,” which means always at least be pushing to see if you can find a narrative form to everything which works.  Should EVERYTHING be ABT?  Probably not EVERYTHING.

It’s kind of parallel to the South Park guys with their Rule of Replacing.  What they say is they go back through the script and, “everywhere that we CAN replace and AND with a BUT or a THEREFORE we do, which makes the storytelling better.”

Notice the key word is “CAN.”  They don’t say to replace everything.  They say only where it works.  Same thing for using ABT in methods and results — yes, if it works, it’s better, but sometimes it doesn’t work so you CANnot.

TANYA WILKINS:  I love that comparison to this being art … I have had a lof of feedback wanting ALL the rules, exactly the process to communicate effectively … I try to explain that a lot of this is organic and based on the research itself. “How is this advancing the narrative?” – great question to keep asking yourself.

Hi Tanya –  You’re maybe beginning to see the source of my title, “Narrative is Everything,” for my last book.  Notice what Vogler says in that Preface I sent you — that the Heroes Journey draws on not just the work of Joseph Campbell, but also Carl Jung who is one of the founders of the entire field of psychology.  It’s very, very deep.

And so towards that end, think of the idea of “advancing the narrative” of your own life.  It’s deep in the psyche — the desire to feel like you’re making some sort of progress in life.  Which then leads you to think of all the people suffering right now from the economic consequences of the pandemic — that the narrative of their life has been derailed.  You start to realize how deep this thing is hitting all of humanity.

ELIZABETH STULBERG:  I would love to have copies of all these chat transcripts. I seem to have missed the ones at the beginning of the course – are they still available somewhere?

Hello again Elizabeth — Good question — I think Matt will work on assembling them somewhere, for posterity.

Marissa: However, I do like the way it feels optimistic with the current “but”

But step back from this and put yourself in the position of someone with no prior experience with this or narrative. What is the problem/conflict that gives you that sense of urgency…that makes you want to know what they did? Making the ‘but’ another positive comment leaves the reader thinking “is there a ‘but’ coming?” There is no issue/problem to solve or address. So why read on? Think back to that comic sketch Randy showed at the beginning. Weren’t you just a little let down that there wasn’t a ‘but’?

A Thought on Jargon

The point is HOW you use jargon. If you throw it out as something your audience must know to understand your narrative then you’re asking them to stop and look it up. But if you, for example, say that we need to know X to understand Y and that [insert jargon] enables us to understand the extent and importance of X, then you’ve used jargon but not forced the reader to stop and read up on what it means…because you’ve told them the most important thing…that it answers your problem. You can then go on later to explain how it does that. Similarly, defining a half dozen acronyms in a short paragraph forces your reader to stop following the narrative and learn the acronyms. It’s not bad to use jargon or acronyms, but it comes back to the point Randy has made several times…that you need to use them in a way that advances the narrative (or, I would add, stops your reader in order to learn what they mean). This is why Randy for one case said don’t worry about jargon but with a later abstract said part of the problem was they lead with jargon. Hence Randy’s “…use jargon but in a narrative way.”

mcollier: Yes, I always refer to cascading effects as falling dominoes when writing with the public in mind

Excellent! It is an easy illustration that says LOTS about the inevitability of a cascade and that it can begin with a small act…but you don’t have to explain it!

Dean: Could this be a graduate-level structure: AND BUT THEREFORE BUT THEREFORE…

It’s a thumbnail version of what in Houston: We Have A Narrative is called the Logline…and is at the core of the Heroes’ Journey.

Julie: I find this “fight” to state things simple so fascinating.  Medical doctors and scientist need their egos’ + confidence to succeed – but when communicating (or talking) with outer circle, do ego’s get in the way?

Julie, I have no idea what you are talking about. In all my career I have never seen even the slightest shred of professional ego from any scientist or MD (and if you believe that I have a bridge for you). Short answer: yup!

Allyson: Do you recommend using ABT in press releases? Any good examples out there?

I don’t have immediate access to examples but YES! If you want to be sure that the media gets your story correctly you NEED to give them the narrative you want. It’s not a given that they won’t go a different direction but you’ve made putting your information into a story MUCH easier. One of our early graduates of Story Circles had a major paper and he structured the press release for it as an ABT and the stories that emerged in papers around the world reflected his narrative. Another good use of it is to coach scientists who are about to be interviewed to have several short ABT responses in mind for likely questions. Again, if you make it easy for a reporter it’s more likely that they’ll repeat your message. Many years ago I was interviewed by a newspaper science reporter about a major study on which I worked. But I rambled and shortly into the interview he said, “Look, here’s what I want to say that you told me.” He read a sentence with which I did not agree…but I gave him no alternative. So the next morning, his sentence is what I “said.” Yes it was dishonest, but the point here is that I let him control the narrative.

Questions about using ABT in a longer piece

As Randy explains, we are working with a single ABT for you. That is to build the ability to recognize it and develop it. As you grow in learning how to use narrative it becomes more intuitive. After a couple years of working with Randy I sat down one day to write a short fictional piece about the adventures of a surfer named (oddly enough), Randy. It was one of those pieces where I started with a place and described “Randy’s” day. But what I found was that as I was writing I could “feel” things slow down (to becoming more AAA) so had to pause and think of a “but” that occurred to pick things up again. I now see this sort of “rhythm” in most things I write. In a larger piece, like a grant proposal, there should be an overarching narrative that is a concise and simple answer to “why should we give you this money?” But the “journey” through what you describe in detail should also contain “smaller” ABT structure that serves to advance the overall narrative.

Elizabeth: I think the If/Then idea is powerful, especially in science writing. I’ve been trying to incorporate it into my writing for the last week or so, but I can’t square the IF in my ABTs with the BUT because then where does the THEN go?

Here’s one thought: The IF/THEN isn’t always the solution but it can be powerful for some things. 

If we could fund 10 student research programs Then we would markedly improve the output of our degree candidates BUT we lack the funding for such a program. 

So the IF/THEN sets up the hypothetical ideal and the BUT says what the problem is in achieving that. And the Therefore is how you will solve that problem.

Marissa: There’s been a lot of emphasis on increasing our but/and ratio, but at what point does our work tip from a good amount of buts to DHY?

The ratio is a “rule of thumb” type measure. Too many buts is not the issue in DHY as much as too many narrative threads. The key is not the number of buts BUT rather, do they all advance the core narrative. Michael Crichton’s AAAS speech has a very high But/And ratio but it never deviates from his core narrative. Robert’s point is accurate.

Robert: The point about DHY is that each D, H, Y is introducing a different narrative direction.

Molly: Question for later: The ABT narrative format is more effective than the boring AAA format. However, in your experience, are there repercussions to avoiding the “expected” AAA format when communicating with traditional academics? Essentially: is it risky for an early-career scientist to “challenge the status quo” and use ABT format in scenarios where peer review/funding depends on it?

You’re always going to run into academics who “know” how something should be written and will never like anything that doesn’t fit their narrow definition. I had a colleague whose attitude about writing was that he did not want ABT but rather AAA. His reasoning was that he didn’t want to be told the point of the writing but rather get all the data and make the decision for himself…and to be quite charitable, his writing was uninspiring. But granting agencies and grant reviewers want, above all else, to know WHY SHOULD I CARE? If you make them figure that out for themselves they’ll put your proposal down half-way through. Several years ago I walked into a review meeting and one of the reviewers held up a proposal and said, “I’m half way through this and I STILL don’t know what he’s doing!” So I would argue that because peer review or funding depends on it you SHOULD use narrative. Recall the explanation by Cathleen Hapeman from the AAAS Video about how well their plan did in review. I was in that review observing and the fact that the plan was crystal clear from the outset what it was about is what made the outcome so successful.

Eric: I think Randy said the AAA works well for your inner circle, but not so well for the outer.

But too often the “inner circle” is smaller than we think. For a group near the inner circle you may not need as much set up…but it’s always good to begin with the parts everyone agrees on before telling them about the problem you want to solve.

Tanya: I love that comparison to this being art … I have had a lot of of feedback wanting ALL the rules, exactly the process to communicate effectively … I try to explain that a lot of this is organic and based on the research itself. “How is this advancing the narrative?” – Great question to keep asking yourself

Tanya, in the words of Obi Wan Kenobi, “You have just taken a step into a larger world” ☺

Regarding Crichton

What lay under his disaffection with science? We may never know the answer. Some speculation: Perhaps some of it was his understanding that scientists are only human. Some of his heroes are scientist as are some of his villains. But also there is a tendency in the scientific community to eschew those who are seen as “popularizers.” Stephen Jay Gould ran into this difficulty as did Carl Sagan. Science’s conceit is too often that they want people to believe “we have all the answers.” That is counter to the real situation which is that we have an answer that is based on our best interpretation of the data we now have. So it’s not that science is wrong when the estimates for CoVID deaths changes but that it has new data. Crichton knew this about science and saw that the public did not. I recall a question at the press briefing after his talk at AAAS. He was asked how many and which genetic engineering firms he visited before writing Jurassic Park. His answer: “NONE! None of them know how to make a dinosaur!”

Questions about Television Series that don’t seem to have a clear narrative.
As Randy said, the individual shows are very well constructed with clear narrative WITHIN the show. Each episode has an “ordinary world” beginning, a ‘crisis’, and then a journey to a conclusion. More difficult sometimes is the narrative arc over the whole show. That can be simple (A planeload of people is heading to ???, but the plane crash lands on a deserted island, therefore they must learn to live together in order to escape.). But as a series drags on the progress of that narrative can get bogged down in the need to come up with 2 or 3 more seasons that were not anticipated. What made the short series Firefly so good was that they spent a season with interesting individual stories while also slowly developing an overarching story that was completed in a movie after the series was cancelled. Worse yet are series like Dark Matter where the major story arc builds to the reveal of a big conflict but because the series was cancelled, it was never resolved. For another good series that builds both individual and a larger story arc see the Canadian series Flashpoint.

Eric: Should we be linear in the structure of our ABTs? For example, instead of “Because of our mission, we do xyz and…”, should we make it linear by saying “We do xyz because of our mission…”
Like in much of this the short answer is “it depends.” The point is to not make your reader work to catch your narrative. In general being linear means you are not making your reader “resort” things in their minds while they are reading (which is why reading something that is chronological is easier to follow). So for me the principle is not to force my reader to do the sorting out.

James: I think part of the value of ABT is that it promotes good flow of information. Too many nominalizations and passive constructions screw that up – so I would quibble with Randy on that – there’s not a neat content/form distinction on this – but I think it’s probably easier to talk about ABT as Randy does, but look at passives etc. when you go back to writing on your own – it’s a form of sentence issue and ABT is kind of a form of idea / form of thought template, it seems to me.
I don’t think you are wrong in the importance of active over passive voice, but that is one of those issues that are for AFTER you have a clear narrative. First get the narrative and then issues like this fall into the area of refining it to be concise and compelling.

Robert: With big environmental issues like burning fossil fuels leading to sea level rise, there is some value in simply repeating these over and over in different context (eg south florida) because so far people aren’t getting it.
Yes people need to hear the message repeated but simply repeating it the same way each time can lead to a kind of deafness because “nothing’s new.” A weak analogy. Many years I spent a month working for a U.N. agency in Rome and was frequently asked to go to talk with people at another NGO across the city whose offices were in what had once been a cheese factory. My first time there the stench was almost unbearable. By several visits later nothing had changed but I never noticed it.

Dean: Albertha — an example in my mind of what I think may be “incomplete causality” is a science fiction novel I remember reading and being disappointed with. After hundreds of pages setting up a complex and dire situation with a number of interesting characters, the problems were all resolved when they stumbled across a storehouse of alien technology with near-magical powers. Hmph. There was no reason for that thing to be there, and it magicked away all the knotty problems we’d come to appreciate. Just effect, no cause.
Sort of like the disappointment I felt in the 1980s when a several yearlong and critically-acclaimed medical drama revealed in the final episode that the whole thing had been in the mind of a special needs little boy.

Evelyn: Since Randy didn’t get to talk about that ocean comment Liz brought up above from Euan, can he or one of the other experts say something about it (about getting people to care about thigs they can’t see, like the ocean)?
Not always a solution, but often I find it useful to find a simple little story from which I can use as an analogy. Get someone to understand the relationship between tadpoles and the contamination of a small pool before jumping into the impact of polluting the oceans on whales. And in a talk, if you start that with the magic words “Let me tell you a simple story…” the audience is primed to listen. But if you start with listing facts about the ocean they’ll be wondering where you are going and “when are we going to get there?”

Albertha: How is the Dobzhansky Template used in relation to the ABT Framework? Example is it done before delving into the framework?

Mike: I’ve used it both ways…before it has provided an organizational touchstone and after it helps to confirm the singularity of my narrative. So the short answer is “it depends.”

Evelyn: This morning I am thinking about privilege and gender and whether there is any study of how/if narrative differs for women, or for people of from different cultures, or differing levels of privilege.  

Mike: Evelyn, see the preface to Vogler’s book. He discusses this precise question.

Robert: IF the “Therefore” past is the longest, isn’t it going to introduce new ideas not mentioned in the And and But sections?

That’s the point of the singular narrative. The Therefore section doesn’t give you license to talk about anything you want. It gives you the opportunity to address the conflict you set up WITHIN the context of the And. If you “wander off” into other things that’s what we call a “sidebar.” The problem with scientific and even nonscientific writing is we have lots of neat “bits” we want to add but that aren’t really advancing the narrative and then you wind up with the problem of new directions and new ideas…and can lose the reader.

tim: Does NI explain why some social media posts go viral? I”m wondering about the two Bakersfield doctors who surging in popularity with misinformation about COVID and shutdown orders.

The public is primed for their narrative: “Everyone says COVID is dangerous but our data shows it’s not, so don’t be afraid.” Even if they don’t say this, there are others who will.

DELL: I have a general question here: what is it that we want to be able to do, know and apply following this course with the ABT? I am enjoying the process and getting a feel for the ABT but kind of wondering where it goes from here? Thanks!

We’re hoping that having become familiar with narrative you’ll keep working with it and using it and letting that growth in knowledge filter through all of your communications…so just basic transformation…nothing huge ☺.

Today we had a minor breakthrough in how to get the most out of the Chat Window. From here on, let’s have the general guidelines be these: During my presentation, everyone should focus on posting QUESTIONS that I will answer (most of them) either in the Q&A or here. Then during the ABT Build session you should switch more to COMMENTS to help the person presenting.

Here’s a few answers to questions.

TV SHOW STRUCTURE

Tim Watkins:
“Lost” was aggravating because it didn’t follow the archplot form. But it was wildly popular and engaging, yes?

Yes, the numbers don’t lie. I never got into it, but I know it was a huge hit and even television milestone.

As you say, it wasn’t archplot overall, but on the smaller scale it was endless ABT arcs. And think about how strongly it drew on the central power of narrative — contradiction. Everything defied expectation — “we would expect them to see this, BUT …”

Michelle Collier:
Game of Thrones has multiple protagonists but is wildly popular. Do you have any thoeries as to why this series doesn’t fit the sinlge protagonist prescription?

GoT is “episodic” television, which means the story goes on, but episodes are packed with ABT “arcs” at all scales. And then, as you saw, the entire series eventually worked to it’s final THEREFORE.

BUT … if you HAD to say, how would you answer, in the end, the question of, “Who’s story is it?” I think I know the answer, even though I didn’t watch all of it.

Aline Zimerman:
How do you explain the success of TV shows with multiple protagonists, like FRIENDS?

Once again, TV tends to be episodic. Most episodes on sitcoms tend to have 3 story arcs. For each one, you can almost always answer the question of, “Who’s story is it?” Right? Think through your favorite episodes and see if you can answer that.

NY TIMES WRITERS GUIDELINES

Tanya Wilkins:
Would it be possible to share those guidelines from NY Times?

FROM DEAN: https://www.amazon.com/York-Times-Manual-Style-Usage/dp/081296389X

MICHELLE WOLF:

Evelyn Wight:
What year was this Michelle Wolf event?

Here’s the link, but be forewarned, it’s not for delicate ears. She opens with, “Like a porn star says when she’s about to have sex with Trump, let’s get this over with.”

Great session, keep the comments and questions coming.

On Monday I talked about Christopher Vogler’s iconic book, “The Writer’s Journey.” After re-reading the 14 page Preface that I talked about, I’ve decided it’s such an important piece of writing that I’m just going to email the pdf of it to all of you for you read over the weekend if you’re interested. It’s really great.

Here’s some answers to questions …

THE SINGULAR NARRATIVE THING

Julie Claussen: The Dobzhansky Template, the Christmas Tree, the One Thing are all shades of the same horse – yes?

Great observation, Julie. Yes, pretty much — basically two tools (Dobzhansky, Xmas tree) to help you find the One Thing. Which kinds of underscores how difficult the challenge is, and leads to this great comment from Evelyn.

Evelyn Wight:
It takes courage to select and stick to a “one” narrative when you live in complexity.

Absolutely. Keep thinking about what I say — “Narrative is Leadership.” Just saying, “We’re gonna do EVERYTHING!” isn’t leadership. You have to pick a singular direction.

Albertha Joseph-Alexander:
The D-template helps you to come to writing your ABT framework with greater clarity. It’s like a good funnel to start to writing.

Great comment — love the term, “funnel” to think about the Dobzhansky (or Bob Jansky).

COUNTING WORDS

Lianne Allen-Jacobson:
For the narrative index, have you counted the number of THEREFORES to see if documents tend towards DHY?

Hi Lianne (and Marky Mark) – The usefulness of counting words is somewhat of a function of their frequency. As you saw with the World Bank reports, the word “and” is a really good index because it is used so much. “But” becomes a little more marginal because first, it’s not as common, and second, there’s a number of synonyms used a lot, BUT … it’s still pretty reliable, especially when combined with “and” in the Narrative Index (BUT/AND).

However … (another word of contradiction), things are just too sparse when you get to “therefore.” Two reasons for that. First, the word is pretty uncommon. If you look at the Wikipedia page you see that it’s not even in the Top 100. Also, you see that “so” is number 41, but it’s only sometimes used as a force of consequence. And most important, most discussions seem to ratchet through a lot of agreement, contradiction, agreement, contradiction, while only occasionally coming to consequence/synthesis. All of which leads to no point in trying to quantify it.

NARRATIVE IS EVERYTHING, BUT ABT IS NOT NECESSARILY EVERYTHING

TIM WATKINS: Does NI explain why some social media posts go viral? I”m wondering about the two Bakersfield doctors who surging in popularity with misinformation about COVID and shutdown orders.

That was a real mess what those two guys did. They are not epidemiologists. They run Urgent Care facilities in Bakersfield, did a little bit of COVID-19 testing, then extrapolated their opinions into the pronouncement that much of the public is desperately wanting(from ANY medical voice) — that the pandemic is over with. Epidemiologists were so horrified by their stunt that they convinced Youtube to remove the video of their press conference.

As to why it went viral, it’s a simple case of “arouse and fulfill.” The mass audience was hyper-aroused, searching for this one specific message, ready to accept it from literally anyone with even marginal credentials. These guys delivered it, that was all it took for LOTS of people, including a couple of my friends to fall for it.

Keep in mind what I’ve said before — if the audience is “aroused” — meaning they’re in the INNER CIRCLE — they don’t need ABT structure.

Here’s the CNN account.

PRACTICING ABT

Christina Dorado:
Is there an app for practicing the skill of ABT?

Christina – no app so far, but this is the purpose of the Story Circles idea — the value of pulling together 5 people who are versed in the ABT Framework to work on ABTs using the basic principles we’re practicing in the ABT Build sessions.

The next best thing to Story Circles is what Liz is working on pulling together — some sort of meeting place for folks after we’re done on May 11.

DELL:
I have a general question here: what is it that we want to be able to do, know and apply following this course with the ABT?

The one and ONLY goal of the course, as well as Story Circles, is the development of, “narrative intuition.” I delve into this in detail in, “Houston, We Have A Narrative.” It’s the goal of getting yourself to the point where you’re no longer thinking of the words in your head, but rather sensing the three forces at work (Agreement, Contradiction, Consequence) as you read, write and present material.

As the Vogler book makes clear, it takes a lifetime to master this, and even then, no one is ever perfect at it (especially in a rapidly changing society), but you gotta start somewhere, which is what this is all about.

TITLES?

Lianne Allen-Jacobson:
How do you approach titles? Should they be mostly A, B, or T?

Great question, Lianne. What do YOU think? Seriously. Let me know your thoughts. Anyone else, too.

SOME OF MY FAVORITE NON-FICTION BOOKS ON THIS STUFF

Robert McLachlan, in an email, asked if I would share a few of my favorite non-fiction books that relate to what we’re talking about. Here’s ten that I have loved over the ages. They’re all pretty old, and somewhat dated in some cases, but they’re all brilliantly written and made big impressions on me over the years.

1 THE POWERS THAT BE – American media history in the 20th century through 4 individuals

2 AMUSING OURSELVES TO DEATH – pretty much predicted Trump

3 ECONOMICS OF ATTENTION – the shift from substance to style in our society

4 FUTURE OF THE PAST – is history becoming useless trivia?

5 NEGOTIATING WITH THE DEAD – Margaret Atwood, great writer on writing

6 IN SEARCH OF EXCELLENCE – a landmark book in the 80’s that is about narrative at its core

7 ADVENTURES IN THE SCREEN TRADE – one of the greatest screenwriter/storytellers ever

8 STORY – Robert McKee, the screenwriting guru’s bible

9 LOSING GROUND (Pulitzer nominated) – why environmentalism became a mess, by my hero Mark Dowie

10 THE SHALLOWS – what the internet is doing to our brain

STEVE JOBS STANFORD COMMENCEMENT SPEECH

James Spencer:
Steve Jobs commencement speech – awesome abt

Awesome example. Here it is, folks. I recommend you copy and paste into your word processor, then do the color coding exercise — identifying each sentence as a simple statement of AGREEMENT (blue), a statement of CONTRADICTION (red), or a statement of CONSEQUENCE (green). I have no idea what you’ll find, but it should be interesting and will be a good exercise of the narrative part of your brain.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.

Thank you all very much

First off, huge thanks to my buddy Park Howell for joining us.

How much fun is that video montage of all the Pandemic commercials.

Read some of the comments — they’re hilarious.  As Park pointed out to me, the guy who put this together intended it as a somewhat insulting portrait of all the manipulative advertisers, which it is.  But for us, it’s a pretty good educational tool showing clear as day the basic three part template of Agreement, Contradiction, Consequence.

Which leads me to my first point and semi-concern.

The goal of all that I do is SIMPLICITY.  I’m talking to you Dean Pentcheff and Evelyn Wight (and lots of others).  Keep in mind, complexity is easy, simplicity is really, really hard, yet very, very important in communication.  You’ve got to keep pushing yourself for it.

I get a little concerned when I read through the chat log from the session that at times there’s a feeling of everyone adding on, “And there’s this — and this — and this — and this …”   Which is great, but … everyone, please, keep trying to bring things back to these three fundamental forces and seeing the core SIMPLE elements.

Remember that quote from Joseph Campbell:

Think deeply about what he was saying there — notice the part I put in red — OF COURSE there are differences, BUT … don’t get distracted by the differences.  It’s fun as a fan of everything cool in the world to marvel and wallow in the differences — it’s what makes the world interesting, BUT … if you’re looking to make sense of the world, the path to that lies in the similarities.

This is basically what science is — looking for the simple commonalities — the theories and formulae that underpin all the variation.  That is what you want to be searching for, just as Joseph Campbell did, so brilliantly.

Which takes you back to the video of the pandemic commercials.  You could watch all of the commercials that the clips come from and find yourself fascinated by how different they all are.  OR … you could look for similarities and eventually hit the realization of, “Hey, wait a minute — these things all have the same basic three part structure.”

And by the way, if you’re not familiar with this iconic commercial from Apple in 1984, it is regarded as one of the greatest television commercials in history.  Have a look — you’ll now see the three part structure:

PARK HOWELL’S PODCAST EPISODE ABOUT HIS BROTHER

Park is such a great guy, as you could see.  I was terrified for he and his brother a month ago when he texted me the news that his brother had the virus.  This is a really powerful episode for which you’re welcome to consider that really heartless comment, “Just because it happened to you doesn’t mean it’s interesting.”  This did happen to Park, but it is indeed interesting because, first, it’s painfully timely, and second, it has a clear narrative structure with the problem-solution dynamic at it’s core — his brother developed the problem of the virus, the doctors finally solved it, but ugh, it is a really painful journey he had to undergo.  And is worth everyone listening to — especially if, like me, you don’t yet know anyone who has been hit this hard by the virus.

Here’s a few more items I’ve picked out of the chat log.

ELEVATOR PITCH

MARISSA METZ:  How do we address the issue of “just because it happened to you…” when writing things like cover letters and personal statements? They are supposed to be about ourselves, but I often find these types of pieces VERY boring to read.

This is the absolute place for the ABT.  The challenge is “get to the but as quickly as possible” (or as Park put it, “nail the but”).  Remember what Jerry Graff and I have both concluded — that “but” is THE most important word in the English language.  Therefore … imagine a cover letter that begins with, “Look, I like rich kids just as much as the next rich parent does, but let me tell you about where I grew up and how it influenced my view of the world.”

That’s maybe a little too much attitude, but compare that to the standard And, And, And structured essay — “I grew up i the suburbs of Chicago.  I went to Aurora Hills High School where I developed an interest in … Zzzz …”

Bottom line, practice nailing the but.  Liz and I nominate that as the official slogan for this course.  “The ABT Framework:  Nail Your But.”

TALKING ABOUT THE PROCESS

VANESSA KOLLMAR:  I’ve been told that “we dont care about the process you took to get your answer”. I always thought that the meat of the story was in the failures. good to hear its ok to talk about the process

As you know by now, there’s a lot of simplicity and repetition in my answers.  This one fall under the simple note of, “Have good narrative structure.”   If you’re prone to fall into the And, And, And structure, then by all means, pleeeeeease don’t tell us about the process you took to get your answer.

BUT … if you’ve developed a good eye for narrative, then you’ll be able to seduce us into listening to “the process you took to get your answer,” without our even knowing it.  Think about what I was saying about STAGE 6 – the Darkest Hour.  That is the sort of way that you can draw us in.

“Let me tell you about how I almost had to quit graduate school because I made such a mess out of my dissertation research.  I thought the best way to study the cold water physiology of fishes was to go observe them in the wild in Antarctica.  I wasted an entire year of my life before I realized that I could address what I was interested in by never leaving my laboratory …”

There are lots of ways to tell a good story about how the research was done, you just need to develop the ability to spot good story elements in the middle of a bunch of stuff that might otherwise look dull.

SITUATION, CONFLICT, RESOLUTION TEMPLATE

ALBERTHA JOSEPH-ALEXANDER: How does the situation, conflict and resolution business framework link to making the customer the hero, the business the facilitator and the business overcoming failures?

I don’t know anything about linking them.  I only know what I heard at Deloitte, which is that they use the template to analyze case studies of businesses.  For example, SITUATION:  A company producing widgets successfully for 30 years, CONFLICT:  A new product threatens to take over their market, RESOLUTION:  Rapid research on their widgets produces a new, more effective design that regains the market.

That’s all I know about that template.

“THERE IS NO SCIENCE COMMUNICATION”

ANTONIA FLORIO: Can you explain a bit more about what it means that science communication doesn’t exist? do you mean it shouldn’t be a separate field?

This is a fairly terrible thing for me to say, but we’ve got 10 sessions here for me to keep making the point so hopefully everyone is fairly clear on it eventually.  My point is that the core principles that dictate how to communicate science effectively are universal principles that underpin the communication of economics, medicine, sports, entertainment, politics — everything.

Things like the basic “know your audience” — that’s true for the communication of everything.  Remember my story about the old guy showing his photos of surfers to the group of activists.  Half of the audience had little interest in surfing.  That was an exercise in the communication of a sport, but it was the same dynamic as science.

All the basic principles of communication (like “arouse and fulfill”) are universal to all subjects.  Narrative is the hardest part of the challenge.  It turns out the people of Hollywood have figured out more about the practical side of narrative than any other profession, so it’s important that people open their minds enough to be able to learn from outside their profession.

I got a dose of this when I did a workshop with diplomats at the State Department.  Most of them got a lot out of it as I presented them the ABT Framework.  But one person left halfway through the day, telling everyone, “This guy knows NOTHING about our world — he’s from the science world — this is a waste of our time.”

There’s a LOT of people I’ve encountered in the “science communication” world with the same attitude — “Your not from the science world, what could you possibly know that could be useful to us.”

Don’t be like that.  There is no such thing as “science communication” in the real world.  Only communication principles applied to science.

POSITIVE MESSAGING

EVELYN WIGHT:  Current best practice/research is that positive messaging is better than negative messaging (in environmental field) – thus the success of ocean and earth optimism. It certainly FEELS better. But does it actually do a better job of getting people to act/change behavior?  Can you share some thoughts about how or whether success stories impact behavior change?

This is a VERY deep topic at the moment.  Did you hear about the documentary Michael Moore produced and released last week for Earth Day titled, “Planet of the Humans”?   It set off a firestorm of anger on Twitter over the weekend.  It basically poops on all the positive messaging of the green renewables movement.  It specifically addresses the “win-win” idea of business and environmentalists partnering and pretty much says, “Nope, sorry, doesn’t work.”

Lotta people are very angry about the movie, but there’s a lot of truth to it.

The problem with positivity alone is that it gets numbing, and it glosses over the complexities of the real world.  We’ve had a horrible dose of it for the past two months with a president who feels passionately that it is his job to “maintain morale” with constant positivity, even it if involves a massive amount of lying.

We can talk a lot more about this.  I’ve had a big dose of it in my ocean conservation work with my Shifting Baselines Ocean Project that I ran from 2002 to 2005.  People love success stories, but should the truth be compromised to deliver them?  I don’t think so.

Tough issue.

Here’s the Michael Moore movie.  Watch at your own risk and peril.

There were a lot of thoughtful and insightful questions and comments in the chatbox today! I’d like to follow up on one of the questions/discussions about doom and gloom messaging for environmental organizations. I see this come up again and again, and I know there are a bunch of studies out there as well as some good and not-so-good Twitter hot takes, but a couple of my go-to publications are put out by the Center for Research on Environmental Decisions at Columbia (“Connecting on Climate: A Guide to Effective Climate Change Communication” and “The Psychology of Climate Change Communication”) which integrate a nice array of solid empirical research that is applicable beyond the issue of climate change. Randy referenced Daniel Kahneman in an earlier session; there’s a lot of cognitive psychological principles in these guidebooks. The takeaway is that if you do have to invoke what is considered “doom & gloom” messaging (and let’s face it, that IS the reality and a big part of our “ordinary world”), you need to follow up with some specific “what you can do” messaging, to keep your audience from checking out due to hopelessness. There’s your “therefore.” This is where Jeremy Jackson & Nancy Knowlton landed as Randy noted during the session; they went from a depressing fixation on the “doom & gloom” to forming the ocean optimism summit. Another great communicator who balances the “despair and hope” thing really well is Katharine Hayhoe. Check out her YouTube series “Global Weirding” for starters.

I also brought up New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo in the chatbox as I have been following his coronavirus briefings and paying attention through the lens of not just communication principles, but some of these behavioral science concepts as well. Check out this opinion piece from the Guardian that outlines “best practices” for leaders during this global crisis. You’ll see the alignment with behavioral science concepts, and you have heard Randy make reference to a lot of these themes as well during the past four sessions. Cuomo is one example of a leader skillfully and intuitively checking many of these boxes. So next time you hear his, or another one of these leaders’ speeches (for instance New Zealand’s PM Jacinda Ardern), watch for these principles in action.

Fascinating session. For me the most interesting note was when Randy explained how your “A” and “B” should lead the reader to wanting to know the answer in the “T.” This is part rules and a LARGE part an art that is learned by doing. The set-up is just that…a set up of the issue you are addressing. What is the central argument of your piece? The A should begin to set that up…not just list a few random facts…remember the SNL piece from the first session? “Is there a “but” here?” You want the reader to be thinking ahead of you wanting to know what the conflict/issue is…why things won’t work, what is the barrier, what is needed? Now they’re ready to listen to your solution…but even there be sure you focus on the solution to the issue you raised. 

Tim: Narrative is the sequence of events that occur in the special world — which is entered through a problem and exited through a solution

Almost…but you need the set-up which occurs in the Ordinary World. Lots of science talks begin with “We set up this experiment in this way…” That’s jumping into the Special World without telling me anything about where you started or why…you miss the “why should I care.”

Evelyn: Past, Present and Future sounds like a good framework for elevator speeches

Cara: I think the ABT is very useful for elevator speeches 

Only if you can keep it from being a list of what you did in the past, what you’re doing now, and what you’ll do in the future. Instead of “here is a situation, here is the problem, and here’s what I’m doing to solve it.”

Julie Claussen For NGO’s, interesting to shift thinking of not being the Hero (we can save the world)…

Cara: I am would be curious how many companies followed this advice of changing the “Hero” of the brand to the audience instead of it being the company?

Dean: Perhaps it’s important that the BUT is limited to stating the crisis situation, where all facts and “things” are in the AND, preceding the BUT.

So, across all of our disciplines — are our audiences the hero? And we (organizations) the mentor?

Not necessarily. Depends on your audience and what you want to say. It’s very powerful in branding, however.

Tanya: What if people think sharing the trying times is ‘unprofessional’??

Tad: That was a great question, because “sounding professional” is the antithesis of an interesting narrative.

I think a good narrative makes you sound more professional because it demonstrates a strong command of the subject…

Robert: Evelyn, maybe a 2:1:3 ratio for A:B:T addresses your point

Don’t fall into the trap of setting up a mathematical “boundary.” These are principles but the application of them is a learned “art.” So my usual answer to “How long should an A, B, or T be is “long enough but not so long that you bore the reader.”

Liz Foote there’s some great psych research on how you NEED to include “what you can do” SPECIFIC actions if you’re using the “doom & gloom” messaging. I’ll post a resource in the narrative knowledge section

One of the most memorable symposia I attended as a grad student was by a geneticist who quickly got through the A and B or a problem and launched into a description of the experiment that was the T…only to reveal at the end that it was a total failure for reasons they had not anticipated. By then we were all anxious to hear how they were able to overcome the problem (their “darkest hour”). Showing a failure is an opportunity to demonstrate your ability to think creatively and push through to a solution.

Another great session. It should by now be evident that narrative is a powerful tool that takes work to achieve. These sessions are pretty intense with lots of material coming at you. Take some time to let it “settle in.” Rather than dive right into revising what you are working on, take a walk, exercise, even take a nap (we can these days without “the boss” wondering what we’re doing!). Then come back to the material with fresh eyes. Many of the best writers would tell you that their most difficult problems were not solved “pen-in-hand” but on a walk through the garden.

Robert: Randy’s last point sounds important. It may be quite difficult to know what people know already and what their ordinary world is.

Too often we are afraid to set up the ordinary world thinking we’ll bore a knowledgeable audience. Think of it more as being sure you and your audience all begin on the same page. If it’s closer to an inner group it need not be long…but it must be there. This is also where the “if…then” can be extremely powerful as it hints to the audience where you intend to go.

euan: May take quite a b it of effort and care to find the agreement.. when dealing with the farming community  have found staggering perspectives I would never have guessed. So if you miss “agreement” with your audience your stuffed???

I have seen people find the agreement in a physics paper…if you can get even two physicists to agree on something farmers (where most of my work is) should be easy! Seriously, that’s why it’s important to know your audience.

DELL: Is it important to have the actual words And, But, Therefore in the statement or can it be other words that have the same general meaning?

Park Howell: I think of the And, But & Therefore as narrative buoys that help you navigate a foggy story. When you’re just learning the ABT, use these three words. They may feel stilted once you get the hang of them, but your audience has no idea of the story structure you’re using while you’re making it exceptionally easy for them to digest your story. Use those buoys to safely land your message in the foggy harbor of communication. 

And for me, most often I find that I prefer to leave them in…

Julie Claussen: How do we know we have the “right specifics?” Scientists are told we are often too specific OR topics are very complex… what is the key for finding the best specific(s) to focus on.

It seems to come back to some basic questions. In this case, which best advance the narrative?

Robert: If you listen to a speech in Maori without knowing much of the language, you will here “engari” (but) and “no reira” (therefore) as two of the most common words.

Love this! It’s not about language but about narrative.

James: My cousin, a journalist married to a diplomat, finds diplomats the most boring speakers : )

I used to attend World Bank meetings…and got lots of extra reading done during them!

Euan: The challenge is justifying importance of what I’m about to say (to get attention) in such a short space

Back to that over-riding need: “Tell me why I should care!”

Dean: Yes — less is more. And that’s the advice I hand out when I’m critiquing. How hard it is to cut detail from one’s own work 🙂

Sometimes we are too close to our work. One trick I have used is to challenge myself to reduce the absolute number of words by say 10 or 20 percent. It’s not a rule but for me it makes me look at what I’m saying and helps me find those “interesting sidebar” sentences that don’t actually advance the narrative. 

Julie: On your statement on the importance of specifics.  Scientists are all about specifics and warned not to be too specific… Assume there is an art to finding the right specifics.

There is, it’s called “narrative.” ☺

James: How helpful is pointing out passive constructions /nominalizations in helping people to re-work their ABTs?

Scientists love passive voice…the editors I worked with when writing reports for Congress worked to drive it out of me (and were only partially successful)

James: I’m curious about toggling between AAA and ABT – is it worth pushing students/clients to think about developing ABT habits, even when they are talking to their inner circle.

Yes, first because it’s always more compelling and second because while you may think your whole audience is your inner circle, they all may not be!

Evelyn Wight: Are there resources anyone can share that overlay the principles of narrative/story telling with fund raising and policy making (books, articles, etc.)?

I took a course from the Foundation Center many years ago on grant writing. The most important thing I took away was that my proposals had to make the reader care about my work. Sound familiar? It was not until I met Randy that I learned HOW to accomplish that.