Thomas Söderqvist Science dancing goes back at least to the classic “Protein Synthesis: An Epic on the Cellular Level” performed at Stanford in 1971. And as the organizers of the 2009 Science Dance Contest say, the human body is an excellent medium for communicating science, “perhaps not as data-rich as a peer-reviewed article, but far more exciting”!
This data-poor but body-rich contest is open to anyone at the postgraduate level in any scientific field and in science-related fields like bioethics, history of science or medicine, etc. — in other words this is a great opportunity for all historians of contemporary biomedicine — and the procedure is quite simple:
- make a video of your own science dance.
- post it on YouTube; and don’t forget to include any relevant information.
- mail the url of your video to: gonzo@aaas.org together with your name, current affiliation and status, the title of your Ph.D., the university where it is earned, and completion date, not later than 16 November.
An independent panel of judges appointed by AAAS/Gonzo Labs will then select a total of four winners from the following categories:
- graduate student: best among those currently enrolled in a Ph.D. program
- post-doc: best among those who have a Ph.D. but not tenure at a university
- professor: best among those with Ph.D. and tenure at a university
- popular choice: the video with the highest YouTube viewcount by the deadline
Note that this is a dance contest, not a video contest, so the judges will focus on the quality of the dance rather than any fancy editing you do. The winning dances will be those that most creatively convey the scientific essence of their respective Ph.D. theses.
The winners will be honored guests at the 2009 annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Chicago in February — and are supposed to work with choreographers and dancers to perform live at the meeting.
Read more here (and thanks to Attila for the tip).
