[Editors] Lay language papers

[William T G Litant]

Dear gang:

I have sent the following to our faculty:

"Prof. Vic Sparrow of Penn State recently brought to my attention a  
great service by Acoustical Society of America: ASA regularly selects  
from the technical papers that will be presented at its meetings and  
asks the authors to create lay-language versions, to be posted on the  
ASA Web site. Vic, who is a PI on projects with the Partnership for  
AiR Transportation Noise and Emissions Reduction (http://www.partner.aero 
), the FAA Center of Excellence managed here at Aero-Astro, penned the  
article "Let’s sonic boom a house – without an airplane," http://www.acoustics.org/press/156th/sparrow.html 
, the lay-language version of a paper he will present at the ASA  
meeting in Florida Wednesday. Other lay language papers from the  
conference are posted at http://www.acoustics.org/press/156th/lay_lang.html 
  These papers are often picked up by the press where the contents  
enjoy even wider distribution. Perhaps there are other groups that do  
this.

"I share this with you as I am occasionally called upon by faculty to  
assist in translating technical writings and concepts to formats  
palatable to lay readers. This can be a struggle for individuals who  
don't do this regularly and/or are so close to/immersed in the jargon  
of the field, that they find it difficult to assume the perspective of  
the non-technical world. Vic's paper, and the others posted with it,  
are excellent examples of presenting important technical topics so  
they may be accessed by the general public."


This is handled by ASA's media department, who write to the authors:

 >>>> As one of the media relations managers of the upcoming Acoustical
 >>>> Society of America  meeting in Miami, I am delighted to invite you
 >>>> to submit a lay-language version of the paper that you will be
 >>>> presenting for our World Wide Press room. At each meeting, we
 >>>> invite
 >>>> a few dozen speakers to write such lay-language versions of their
 >>>> papers, and these are posted on ASA's "World Wide Press Room"
 >>>> (http://www.acoustics.org/press). News organizations such as BBC,
 >>>> the New York Times, National Public Radio, New Scientist,  
Discover,
 >>>> and Nature News Service have covered past acoustics meetings in
 >>>> large part due to these lay language papers prepared by meeting
 >>>> speakers. In addition, the papers in the ASA World Wide Press Room
 >>>> are publicly available before, during, and after the meeting for
 >>>> all
 >>>> visitors to the web site to read and appreciate.

I'm not aware that MIT does something like this (and, if we do, as  
Emily Litella used to say, "Never mind," can't keep track of  
everything...) - but wouldn't it be neat to have a Web site where  
faculty contribute lay language versions of papers?

Bill




William Litant
communications director
Aeronautics and Astronautics Department
and
Partnership for AiR Transportation Noise and Emissions Reduction
37-395
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
77 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02139
01-617-253-1564