Science in the Mass Media

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Science in the Mass Media

• Lecture 10
• The internet and museums
• Thursday 26th March

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History of the internet I

• 1962 - RAND Corporation in USA begins research
  into communication networks for military command
  and control
• 1965 - ARPANET developed. A small network to
  promote sharing of computer resources between
  scientists
• 1969 - First 4 universities in USA connected
  through ARPANET
• 1972 - first email programme
• 1973 - ARPANET goes international
• 1974 - Telenet opens. The first commercial
  version of the ARPANET, in UK JANET is
  established
• 1979 - first USENET groups established.
• mid-1980s - growth of the personal computer
  industry, fuels uptake of internet usage in
  commercial and academic sectors

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History of the internet II

• 1985 - Internet, email, newsgroups spread through
  universities
• 1986 - First public use of internet available.
  Freenet
• 1988 - First internet worm unleashed, prompting
  concerns about privacy and security in the
  digital world.
• 1990 - ARPANET is decommissioned, what remains is
  networks of networks
• 1991 - restrictions on commercial usage lifted.
  E-commerce starts. The World Wide Web released by
  Tim Berners-Lee at CERN
• 1993 - The first audio and video broadcasts take
  place over the internet
• 1995 - Internet being hosted by more commercial
  companies.
• 1996 - Nearly 10 million hosts online. Users in
  almost 150 countries

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The internet as a mass medium

• 1.5bn estimated users by Jan 2009
• By region, 41 of the world's Internet users are
  based in Asia, 25 in Europe, 16 in North
  America, 11 in Latin America and the Caribbean,
  3 in Africa, 3 in the Middle East and 1 in
  Australia
• The prevalent language for communication on the
  Internet is English.
• Still a high status medium.
• Tends to be compared to older mediums, but many
  claim it is unlike any previous communication
  media
• Media effects indeterminate, but lots of claims
  both for good and bad

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The internet as a mass medium II

• Many significant differences to older forms of
  communication
• Operates at both small scale and global levels
• Potential globalised audience
• Communication takes all forms, so both collective
  and private medium
• Real-time
• Delayed
• Distributed
• Fluidity of professional categories
• Anyone can created a page/blog, thus be the
  journalist and editor
• You can be both the audience and the broadcaster
  simultaneously
• Voluntary aspect to controls imposed
• We are self censoring? (Exceptions e.g. Google in
  China)

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The internet as a tool of empowerment?

• Many of these reasons used to make claim that
  internet is tool of empowerment and enhances
  democracy
• Allows for greater access of information and more
  collective discussion
• Electronic Athens?
• Is cyberspace a new public sphere?
• Or is public determined by access to
  technology?

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Criticisms of the internet as the new public
sphere

• Its all bread and circuses
• Low grade, junk, keeps the masses happy
• Commodification of the public sphere
• Its all advertising
• Has led to greater fragmentation of society
• Privacy and surveillance concerns
• Who has access to what info?
• Panoptican perspective
• Myth of technological uptopia
• Hypereality will erode real life

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Jeremy Benthams Panopticon, 1787
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The internet and science communication

• In relation to science, move towards open access
  publishing means public have access to previously
  closed, expert channels of science communication
• Are we seeing the democratisation of science?
• Move within traditional media (newspapers and TV)
  to cut down on science coverage and broadcasting
• Leave this to specialised commercial networks, or
  user generated content (science blogs)
• Opinion vs information?
• Less general exposure to science in media?
• What about the medias role as watchdog for
  science?

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The history of the museum

• Museum - dedicated to the muses (ancient Greek)
• Ancient idea of collection, ownership, power and
  access to knowledge
• Ideas about what is valuable
• Collection represents past successes, and
  insurance for the future

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15th and 16th centuries

• Cabinets of Curiosity owned by Princes, Nobility
• Display of power, access to the natural
  world/knowledge
• Francis Bacon (1594)
• Every man of science needs
• Library
• Garden with animals
• Cabinet of man-made things
• Tools
• So collections were tied up with notions of
  observation

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Science museum
VA museum
Natural history museum
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17th century

• Rise of merchant trade meant huge circulation of
  objects
• New people with access to cabinets of curiosity
• E.g. John Tradescant (1656)
• Museum tradescantium
• Became Ashmolean museum in Oxford in 1683
• First science museum?
• Science lectures and education

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Botanic gardens

• Also in 17th C, rise of the botanic garden
• Often attached to a royal palace or park
• Medicinal herb gardens
• Used as collection, lab, medical resource
• Kew Gardens (1759) commercial exploitation of
  certain crops
• Used also as pleasure gardens

Jardin des Plantes, Paris (1650)
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Science communication in museums

• 18th C classification was the big challenge
• Often controversial
• Relationship of things in Nature communicated by
  their placement in cases
• Coincided with enlightenment ideals
• Public mediation of knowledge
• Previously private (royal) collections were
  opened to the public
• Communication of specific messages
• Educational, labels started to appear for public
  to be educated
• But also a form of publicity (Habermas) display
  riches and power of whoever owns the collections
• National Museums there to inspire visitors to see
  greatness of science
• Also to see the power of the nation (Napoleon)
• To impress foreigners as visitor you are going
  into a Royal or State building
• Have to act accordingly (quiet, awed)
• E.g. British Museum (1753), displays the power of
  the Empire

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Material cultures of science

• 19th C shift in methods of display from
  classification to context
• Diorama displays
• Science communicated by positioning of objects
  (material culture)
• Is this really science communication?
• Museums not just about science communication, but
  politics, economics
• See this clearly in Great Exhibition

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The Great Exhibition (1851)

• So museums and exhibitions have a civilising
  function
• Put people in their place, show them the world
  order
• Great Exhibition 1851, brainchild of Prince
  Albert
• 21 Acres in South Kensington
• Crystal Palace built
• 14, 000 exhibitors and 6M visitors
• Showed the primacy of the British Empire over its
  dominions and colonies
• Ahead in technology, industrial revolution
• Sets out to display Britain to outsiders and to
  itself

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European Expositions

• The great exhibition was emulated around the
  world
• In Europe called Expositions, continued right up
  to end of 20th C
• Eiffel Tower was built for the Paris Expo in 1889
• Each country was showing off its power, technical
  ingenuity

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US Worlds Fairs

• In US, new country Worlds Fairs played huge part
  in showing off new nation to world and to its
  own citizens
• Part trade show, part amusement park, part
  educational
• Showing people how to live, introducing new
  products
• 1893 Chicago Worlds Fair
• vision of the future
• Largest Ferris Wheel in world, electricity
  displayed
• Left behind state museums in places where held

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The Festival of Britain (1951)

• Britain staged large post-WWII festival to mark
  centenary of Great Exhibition
• Show off how Britain was after war
• Technologically advanced, progressive nation
• Lots of new products displayed (plastics,
  materials, architecture)
• South Bank redeveloped
• Royal Festival Hall
• Clear political messages

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Exhibiting the Future (now)

• Lots of science communication going on at these
  exhibitions
• Visions of society, future of society, science
  and technology
• Seattle (1962)
• Space needle and monorail
• New York (1964)
• Whole area of NYS redeveloped in futuristic
  style
• Advantage of temporary exhibition - can reflect
  times and interests

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No science in a science museum?

• John Durant stated that there is no science in
  science museums
• Just show old objects, therefore are they history
  of science museums?
• Difficult to exhibit an idea e.g. big bang theory
• Change of pace of technology, what do you
  display?
• What about biotechnological objects (oncomouse)
  or nanotechnology?

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Interactivity in museums

• 1930s Science Museum installed a childrens
  gallery
• About playing with objects, levers, push buttions
• Today called the LaunchPad
• Very successful, but any learning going on? Or
  just entertainment?
• 1960s Frank Oppenheimer set up the Exploratorium
  in San Fran
• Described as informal learning
• Apparatus, equipment, toys
• Learning through the senses
• Exploratory in Bristol also started by
  psychologist Richard Gregory
• Today called a Science Centre
• Lots around the UK

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Interactivity in museums II

• What sort of science communication is happening
  in Science Centres?
• Show basic principles (magnetism, reflection,
  mechanics), concepts which display of objects
  finds more difficult to communicate
• V popular with kids
• Critics say science is decontextualised
• No history, no sense of progress

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Display of science

• Today museums tend of have mixture of
  interactivity and objects
• Clear that the display of science is not a
  neutral process
• Lots of different things being communicated
• Problems of how to show scientific controversy,
  social context e.g. climate change
• What effect does commercialisation of exhibits
  play?

Antennae exhibit in the Wellcome Wing, Science
Museum
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The museum as a communicator of science

• Tend to find museums that combine all sorts of
  display and exhibition techniques now
• Popular as tourist destination, but role as
  science communicator questionable if look at
  visitor studies
• Increasingly commercialised also
• Commodification of display?
• public knowledge or commercialisation of public
  sector?
• Visitor is now a customer
• Balance between collecting and exhibiting
• Availability of seeing things on internet made
  museums redundant?