The Myth of Two-way Interpretation
It’s only two-way if you’re actually listening to what they tell you.
Screw Latin Names.
Latin names have no place in popular writing and programming. Once upon a time I was a bit of a tedious pedant. Hard to believe, I know, but I have vivid memories of tossing around Latin names to impress my audiences. I was young and insecure, trying to do my best with a serious case …
Level Up Your Guided Walks
Those who fail to learn from the 1970s are doomed to repeat them… …and I’m old enough to tell you it won’t be as much fun as pop culture would have you believe, ABBA soundtracks notwithstanding. I was recently transported back to that era against my will, in the form of an interpretive walk. It …
Interpreters in the Experience Economy
Every great travel experience has three parts: the anticipation, the realization, and the recollection. Those of us who deliver interpretive programs—guided walks, talks, workshops, dialogues, and the like—have long placed ourselves squarely in the second of those three phases: the delivery/realization of the visit. With the shift in recent years to new communications tools, it’s …
Of Bats and Myths (and sloppy interpreters)
Myth Making From time to time in my career, I have seen interpretive myths that seem to propagate from interpreter to intepreter. I have seen some doozies over the years. Some day, ask me to tell you about the lobsters running each fall up the Miramichi River. Here’s one circulating at the moment: “We need …
What is Experiential Interpretation?
I’ve been spending a fair bit of time researching and pondering what “experiential interpretation” actually means. Here’s what I’ve come up with. Interpretation is experiential when the interpreter uses a recognizable activity as the structure of the program, and imposes passive listening on the audience less than 10% of the time. It uses traditional activities, …
VERSUS: Debate Club meets Wrestle Mania
Welcome to my new series, Innovators. With this project I’m hoping to highlight people who are pushing the boundaries of interpretation, science communication, and educational visitor experience. And I’m pretty excited to feature, as the first instalment in the series, something about which you may have only dreamed until now: cabaret for total science nerds, …
The Art of Constructive Feedback
I had an opportunity to revisit my old stomping grounds this spring: I gave a keynote presentation to Alberta Parks interpreters in Kananaskis Country, where I began my career in 1982. It was a wonderful, nostalgic experience, and it really brought back to me the value of the training I got from that organization. So …
It’s Time to Stop the May Madness
Writing and producing three programs in three weeks is madness. It has to stop. Here’s a proposal that will result in better programs, better promotions, less overtime, and less stress.
What Is Dialogic Interpretation?
… and why on earth would anybody want to do it? It seems that recently, in my travels where I meet colleagues from the USA, the topic of conversation often turns to the rise of dialogic interpretation: interpretive programming that places an emphasis on getting visitors to talk to each other about the subject at hand. …