As I was reading the
Forwards to Huston Smith's” The Worlds Religion, revised and
updated”, an updated and expanded book from the classic version I
had read in high school, I had a sort of epiphany, not on
the subject of the book (and it is a great book) but on the general
subject of education, presentation and what makes for good
television.
As he
writes of what lead him to write the original book, some 50 years
before, he had been teaching comparative religions, when a local
station, one which would soon become part of the forming the
Public Broadcast System, had asked him to do a program on the
Religions of Man. And as he was working on writing it and the book to
go with it, the director of the program told him “ If
you lose their attention for thirty seconds they switch stations and
you won't get them back. So, make you points if you must-you a
professor so you have to make a points. But illustrate them
immediately, with an example, an anecdote, a fragment of poetry,
something that will connect your point to things your audience can
relate to.”-Mayo Simon.
Huston Smith gose
on to explain, that this experance, the requierment to hold the
audances attintion as he getting his points across, greatly inproved
the book, as is what lead to it long standing popularity. Where there
are many good books on Comparitive Religions, most of the others
where not writen with this in mind.
With this, my
mind heads back, remembering programs which I found interesting and
learned from, that worked, and those which by content should have,
but did not so well.
Alistair Cooke’s America (America: A Personal History of the
United States), and James Burke masterworks of Connections 1
and The Day The Universe Changed, The Story of English with
Robert McNeil and In Search of the Trojan War by Michael Woods
and Ken Burns the Civil War.
As a kid, I always enjoyed the National Geographic
Specials, many of which I still remember, the Jacques Cousteau
specials, and Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom with Marlin Perkins.
Now,
History, well delivered, has a natural narrative and a natural image,
but delivering the more abstract ideas of Religion, Science,
Philosophy and Mathematics, these are more difficult.
Now there is a
quote of Walt Disney's, one which I read paraphased multiple times,
but really captuers it. “I want a place where the whole family can
come to have fun, and whaile there not looking, I sneack a little
knowledge in to them” (Note, I looking for the exact,
orginal sitation. I know Ward Kimble repeted it, as did Michael
Broggle as part of the story of Walt developing the ideas that would
eventually become Disneyland.) Now this was about designing a theam
park/Amusement Park, but can be, and is applied to
Museums, and can even be applied to the art of teaching or of
enetertaining such as in television.
I have
watched many television programs which are basically classroom
lectures, broadcast, this really misses the power of the medium, it
also loses a lot of the interactivity of being in a class.
I, as we all
have, have watch mindless television, a lot like eating cotton candy,
and one thinks afterwards, I have wasted my time with this.
And yet,
Television hold so much promise, it a medium which is able to engage
the mind, use the since of sight, of sound, have movement. It can be
very engaging, use most of the senses we use to learn, to
experiences. (smell, feel and taste are still not used)
This is
where people like James Burke really show how to present a set of
thought provoking and very interesting to watch programs. He starts
with not writing to a 6th. Grade level, he
assumes people are intelligent, but also willing to give ladders to
help any one missing a part of it, to climb up on. He Dose not
present his abstract ideas from a lecture podium, but writes out the
whole presentation, then chose locals, backdrops which are both
interesting , visually to see, and illustrate the topic or question.
These are some time, at first sight, off the wall or odd,
but are chosen, to be, memory aids. ( A stop light in the middle of
the desert being one I remember)
Still Work in
Progress: 01-15-2016
Curtis Neil
