Science Communication Collections at the Niels Bohr Library & Archives

In our recent interview with Dr. John Besley, we learned about his research into strategic approaches to science communication. Science communication is an essential but often undervalued skill for scientists to have. Ranging from how scientists communicate findings to other scientists, funding agencies, and stakeholders, to how they communicate the concepts and significance of science to the general public, scientific communication comes in many forms. It also isn’t just for the scientists; as Dr. Besley states in the interview, “being strategic… [isn’t] about imposing scientists’ view on others. It requires listening carefully to others and considering changes to one’s goals and behaviors in response to feedback.”

At the Niels Bohr Library & Archives, we have many collections related to science communication and even whole book call number ranges dedicated to communication among scientists and to the public perception of science. We’ve created a Research Guide that gives an overview of our scientific communication-related books, archival collections, oral histories, and audiovisual materials that we hope will be useful for both fun and research. Check it out!

Link: Scientific Communication at NBLA Research Guide

In this blog post, we will give a general overview of some of the different types of science communication that you can find represented in our collections. For more details about the collections, check out the Research Guide.

The Art of Science Communication

Max Born and wife Hedwig “Hedi” Born in their native Germany in 1951. Scientific communication across languages and cultures was not just enriching for Max Born’s career but a matter of necessity. In May of 1933, Born became one of six Jewish professors who had to give up his post at University of Göttingen, where he had helped to build up the physics program to a position of prominence, due to the new laws of the Nazi party. He then traveled with his family seeking posts in England, the Soviet Union, and India, before the Borns settled in Edinburgh with Max’s permanent position at the university there. The Borns had their German citizenship revoked by the Nazi party in 1935. Credit: AIP Emilio Segrè Visual Archives, Born Collection. Born Max G17

In communicating with any audience, how you represent your thoughts through language is key. One strength of our collections is in works related to the rhetoric and style of science communications.

As Joseph Silk notes in his 1988 interview with Alan Lightman, rhetoric and style can make a major impact on the persuasiveness of a scientific argument:
 

I find metaphors rather inspiring. That is, verbal descriptions can make a huge difference. One can take a fairly mundane theory, and if you can dress it up in suitably vivid language, that can make enough of a difference to make one read the theory. One is bombarded with so many papers these days. It used to be that one had time to read the abstract, and now you barely have time to read the titles. Vivid language and the title of the abstract are very important. I am impressed by metaphors.

In our collections, you can study how people have communicated science to various audiences over time, the shift in the predominant language (lingua franca) of science, and get tips for communicating science through the art of rhetoric.

The communication of science across language and cultural barriers is also exemplified in our archival and reference collections. We have a large collection of scientific dictionaries designed to facilitate the exchange of scientific ideas across language barriers, both through translation of scientific terminology into other languages and encyclopedic science dictionaries that define scientific concepts for people within a field. In the archives, you can find unpublished autobiographies and memoirs recounting various scientists’ international travels and collaborations, such as Max Born’s travel diaries from his Journey to Russia, 1945, and correspondence and background material on the translation of scientific journals, such as the AIP Advisory Board on Translations of Russian and Chinese journals in the 1950s and 60s.

Communication among scientists

Communication with peers is a core part of the scientific profession. At NBLA, we even have an entire book call number range (C5:9) dedicated to communication among scientists by means of publications, preprints and meetings in the scientific community.

Scientific journals and conferences are two key avenues that scientists use to communicate research and ideas to one another. The American Institute of Physics (AIP) has important ties to scientific publishing in the US, both historically and in the present. The Niels Bohr Library & Archives is the official repository for AIP Publishing as well as several Member Society publications.

Some of the AIP journal titles archived at the Niels Bohr Library & Archives.

In addition to full runs of all of the major journals, conference proceedings, and many of the books published by the American Institute of Physics, we also have several archival collections containing materials related to the publication of peer-reviewed journals.

These include:

• referee and administrative files for journals such as the Physical Review, American Journal of Physics, Physics of Fluids, Physics Today magazine
• divisional and personal papers of past editors and directors of these publications such as AIP Director H. William Koch and Journal of the Acoustical Society of America editor Floyd Firestone
• recordings of lectures and conferences on the process of peer review and the history of Physical Review Letters

We also keep the less formal but still highly valuable newsletters produced by AIP and by our member societies, which you can often find in miscellaneous publications collections such as the American Vacuum Society miscellaneous publications, 1980-2015. Conferences and meeting minutes from AIP and other organizations abound in our collections, including those that came to us by way of donations from physicists who attended these conferences, such as those found in the Benjamin Bauer Collection. These collections provide a valuable resource in understanding publication in the realm of 20th and 21st century science, particularly in the US.

Find more information on these and more in the Archival collections and journals section of the  Research Guide, as well as books by historians on the topic under the Books tab.

Communication with Government and Funding Agencies

Evelyn Harrison (left), Deputy Director of the Bureau of Programs and Standard at the Civil Service Commission, and Nancy Grace Roman (center), Chief of Astronomy and Solar Physics at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) both recipients of the Federal Women’s Award for outstanding contributions to government meet with President John F. Kennedy in the Oval Office on February 27 1962. Roman Nancy C6. Credit: AIP Emilio Segrè Visual Archives, Roman Collection

An important, but sometimes overlooked, audience for science communication is organizations and entities that help provide funding and support for scientific endeavors and who are not always scientists themselves. As modern science is often funded through grants and organizations, the skill of being able to advocate for one’s research and field is very important. In addition, science holds a powerful place in society, with scientists often sought as advisors in world governments and policy organizations. Here at NBLA we have books and oral history collections that explore scientific advocacy and scientific authority, as well as tips for scientists advocating their work.

From the archives manuscript collections

We are lucky to have the papers of Nancy Grace Roman.  Roman was the director of the Astrophysics Program at NASA from the 1950s-1970s and was instrumental in convincing Congress to fund what would become the Hubble Space Telescope. She was a prime example of a figure who was adept at communicating with the government on behalf of scientific progress and dedicated much of her career to it. For more information, see this recent blog post from earlier this year about the Nancy Grace Roman Collection. We prepared that post in conjunction with the June 2024 Trimble Lecture, which featured John Mather and Mark Clampin and also discussed the importance of advocacy and communication in gaining funding and support for space telescopes.

Check out the Research Guide for other examples of what we have!

Communication with the General Public

Timothy Ferris works with equipment. Ferris was the host of "The Creation of the Universe," a science special which appeared on public television.  November 20, 1985. Ferris Timothy F1 AIP Emilio Segrè Visual Archives, Physics Today Collection

One of the most important audiences in science communication is the general public, which is critical for maintaining support and trust in science and inspiring the next generation of scientists. Science communicators play a large role in opening new audiences to science. They often serve as media spokespersons for major discoveries, appear on social media and popular television, and lead efforts to engage citizen scientists in the scientific research process and break down barriers and harmful stereotypes. Although we have examples of this across all collection areas, our greatest strengths for public science communication are in our book and oral history collections.

In our book stacks, section C3:1 is dedicated to “Science and the Public,” which contains works exploring the role of science in society, the public perception of science, and how scientists engage with the public. We also collect works of popular science that make scientific concepts and discoveries accessible to a general audience. These are generally written by science journalists or by expert scientists themselves. For example, we have books by well known scientist communicators such as Carl Sagan, Niel DeGrasse Tyson, Sean Carroll, Lisa Randall, and Michio Kaku in our collections; find these and more in the Research Guide.

Our oral history interview collection includes interviews with many science communicators who specialize in communicating with the general public. Below is a video with examples of oral histories with some science communicators and their thoughts on public scientific literacy; as always, find more in the Research Guide:

• Katie Mack, Astrophysicist and science communicator
• Corey Gray, Science Communicator at LIGO and advocate for Indigenous representation in physics.
• Sean Carroll, Physicist and Author of bestselling popular books on science

We hope you’ve enjoyed this look at our collections from a science communication perspective. If you would like to request any of the materials mentioned in this blog post or in the research guide, please email us at [email protected]. Stay tuned for the next installment in this science communication series: a deep dive into two archival collections, coming soon!