Academics can (and should) be idiots

Have you ever heard an academic admit in a public lecture that they only got into their field to spend more time at the beach?

Or where they accuse another speaker of wanting to dig up poop on hiking trips? 

Or where a bunch of PhD students heckle the academic on stage with T-shirts printed with his catchphrase: “Did you know I went to Oxford?”

What if moments like these – where the boundaries between academic and personal life blur a little – weren’t just a great way to make scholarly work more engaging and relatable but were also enriching and fun for you, too?

Academics on stage: where smart meets silly

Welcome to The Peer Revue. This live show is where smart meets silly. Each month a top-tier researcher takes the stage at a Melbourne comedy club to talk about their cutting-edge work. The cast then use their discoveries as fuel for incredibly silly improv comedy. 

Deakin University education professor (and MC) Phillip Dawson created the show three years ago to “make research engagement more dialogic”. And the night has done that – although perhaps not in quite the way he imagined. 

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Performances regularly feature audience interjections that range from curious and passionate to almost unhinged with brazen prof-on-prof heckling. Members of the public frequently pitch in questions about everything from illicit drugs to bowel movements. And the guests’ colleagues and students relish the chance to subvert the formality and hierarchy that might be part of their professional relationships (as with the endearing T-shirt takedown).

We expected the audience to get a lot out of these shows. What surprised me most was just how much the experience would mean to the scholars who join us on stage. 

Academics can be idiots, too

I taught critical thinking and communication in my early 20s, and, oh boy, did I feel a lot of pressure. I did my best to pique my students’ curiosity while retaining a professional academic persona, never entirely sure how much of myself I should show. Back then, I didn’t know how to handle the dichotomy between the Chris who could speak with authority about “denying the antecedent” and the Chris who co-wrote a ridiculous rap song about accounting for a movie I was directing.

Observing the academics on stage for The Peer Revue, it occurs to me that we’ve created an environment where academics’ different sides can coexist in public. And that perhaps that’s what scholars are craving, as I did 15 years ago.

Before showtime, the academic guest usually gives a nervous disclaimer: “I don’t think I’m very funny.” But once on stage, they smile, laugh and share sides of themselves I highly doubt come out in traditional academic forums. One prof took a long pause before exclaiming: “I’m not hiding it any more! I love trains, OK! I LOVE them! Choo choo, motherfucker!”

One guest said being in the show was the highlight of their year. Another said it was a career highlight. As much as I’d like to credit this to the improv, I think it’s probably more to do with the atmosphere, the camaraderie and the freedom to be their whole damn selves.

And for the record, the guests are always funny. When they’re so unabashedly themselves, sharing all the ups and downs about their work, the things that sparked their passion, and the things that make them tear their hair out...the audience is never less than captivated.

Battering down the gates of the ivory tower...with fart jokes?

Isn’t a captivated audience the dream when it comes to research engagement? An audience that not only understands what you’re trying to communicate but is hungry to learn more?

For the academics, they learn what students and the public are most confused by when it comes to their research area. The things the audience is worried about. Their most burning questions. 

From deep in the academy, it can be hard to know how little scholars in other fields understand about your niche, let alone laypeople. And for the average person, it can be surprisingly intimidating to say: “I don’t understand.” 

Comedy can be a potent equaliser. During shows like The Peer Revue, it’s par for the course to poke gentle fun at an academic who finds themselves knee-deep in a quagmire of jargon. And to poke fun at ourselves while we ask “the stupid questions”. 

One cast member often makes a point of saying: “Sorry, you’ll have to explain that again. I’m just a primary school teacher.” It always gets a laugh, and I can almost feel a sigh of relief from the audience – and the academic. Rather than a knowledge gap fuelling disengagement or even alienation, we end up with laughter and an opportunity for learning. The audience gets a better idea of the topic, and the academic gets insights into what laypeople might need to help them understand.

So, maybe what all this shows is that it’s OK to be a bit of an idiot. It’s OK to make mistakes. To say something a little goofy. To drop the mask a bit. There are a million ways you can inject a bit more playfulness into your academic life. You don’t have to do improv. But you might like to.

Keen to dip your toes in the silly pool?

Here are a few recommendations to get you started:

• My podcast, Amplifying Research, includes episodes on playfulness, storytelling, using comedy in your research communications and making public engagement interactive as well as others about research comms, engagement and impact more broadly.
• Learn improv: find a class near you – two of the best-regarded US schools, the Upright Citizens Brigade and Second City, also offer classes online.
• Look for academic comedy events in your area. In Australia, science communicator Alanta Colley hosts Sci Fight, and the Sydney Comedy School runs Future Science Talks. Storytelling nights such as The Moth can also be great ways for you to watch, learn and practise a different type of public engagement.

With the mounting pressures facing academics – from funding cuts to distrust of science and intellectualism – perhaps we can all take a lesson from the irreverence you’re likely to find at at The Peer Revue in Melbourne every fourth Friday night. The academy could do with more opportunities for smart to meet silly, and for academics to let it all hang out. Choo choo, indeed.

Chris Pahlow is a research communications and engagement strategist and founder of Amplifying Research.

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