The Job Talk as Storytelling

Session Submission Type: Short Course Full Day

Session Description

What is a Job talk? Simple, it is an oral presentation that displays your research. The problem is that you have spent all of your time thinking and expressing your research in a medium other than the oral form of communication. Although the underlying ideas you wish to convey are largely the same, the medium in which you are now asked to express them is profoundly different. The primary challenge in crafting a research talk, then, is this: How do I translate my research from one mode of communication to another? This is precisely the question this workshop seeks to answer and it does so by drawing on storytelling as the central translating device.

This workshop is designed to offer you, first and foremost, a general framework for how to think about the research presentation as storytelling. Our journey will take us through such questions as: What is storytelling? What makes storytelling so compelling? How can it be used in the context of research presentations? Alongside answering these deeper questions, the workshop will also walk through a portion of an actual presentation to demonstrate the principles of storytelling when applied to research. In the afternoon, participants will be afforded the opportunity to start crafting their own research presentation in the form of storytelling.


Schedule

Morning:
- Introduces a general framework on how to think about the research presentation as storytelling.
- Walks through a portion of an actual job talk to demonstrate the principles of storytelling when applied to research.

Afternoon:
- Building on the principles from the morning session, participants now have the opportunity to start crafting their own research presentation in the form of storytelling.

More Description

Who is the audience for this workshop? Anyone interested in learning more about giving research presentations is welcome to join. My immediate goal, however, is to offer this to PhD students about to enter the academic job market — hence the title of the workshop.

Is this workshop mostly lecture based? The workshop will consist of two modes, one where I will be the primary speaker and the other where you will be engaged in small group work. Especially the afternoon session of the workshop will be mostly small group work. Please come ready to participate.

Can participants attend just part of the workshop? Sure. But if you do, I strongly recommend you attend morning session of the workshop. The afternoon will draw heavily on the things introduced in the morning.

Sub Unit

• Pre-Conference Short Courses

Chair

• Josef Woldense University of Minnesota, Twin Cities

Presenter

• Josef Woldense University of Minnesota, Twin Cities