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| Our late dachshund, Daisymay Fattypants, who inexplicably got herself stuck into the leg of a pair of footie pajamas. |
The result was a compilation of clips from 16 women, all talking about why evolution is the unifying concept of the life sciences and why it should be taught in schools.
This video with my tired-looking visage frozen in the frame, has really been making the rounds. It's been featured at the Richard Dawkins site, at Gawker's Jezebel site, on a Guardian blog, (ETA) at Boing Boing, and at Pharyngula. Those of us who are in the video have been called many things, some more flattering than others. While there has been some kerfuffle over the choice of a bigoted intelligent design advocate to call us "gals" and "show mares," I took that less as personally offensive than I took it as more evidence that their agenda has a reactionary religious core. In other news, I'm not sure if my appearance in this video has anything to do with my sudden urge to purchase makeup, but I'm suspicious of a cause-and-effect scenario here.
I'm in love with the way some of the women in this video present themselves and with the way they speak so passionately about science and the central role of evolution in science. What I'm not so in love with is my face and awkward camera presence in the video. Making this thing was, to this relatively video-inexperienced show mare, a matter of difficulty. Where do I put my children? Should I use a script? But I didn't have a teleprompter and felt like I'd look like I was just...reading from a script. Should I wing it? OK, but winging it would result in my being there, on camera, babbling on and on about dachshunds. And why do I seem to be completely unable to move half of my upper lip. Should I consult a neurologist?
It was distracting, making this video. I am passionate about teaching science in science classes. I've taught thousands of students about evolution, approaching it in a way that my nonmajors could understand, showing them that it's not a specter sent by Charles Darwin to destroy their religion or their religious beliefs but instead is an established scientific phenomenon of natural change, a constant and exquisitely shape-shifting dance between living things and their environments.
Did I say that in the video I submitted? Nope. I started out OK, if a little world-weary about what to me is just a no-brainer of a question: Should evolution be taught in schools? Then, I address the question, What is evolution?
It was OK. I was trying hard not to use the word "alleles" because...even students who major in biology for some reason have a hard time with that one. I also managed to get through it without mentioning dachshunds. Dachshunds and I go way back, and I still think they're hilarious. That did not, however, come across in my video, thanks to an extraordinarily flat affect and some off-the-cuff incoherence, so I'm not even going to post that part here.
Then, I get to the most important fundamental information about evolution: It happens. The question is, How does it happen? And yes, this time, I had to bring up dachshunds. I also love this freeze frame. Was it wine o'clock?
And then, something happened while I was making the video. I'd already noticed that my background had all kinds of weird things in it. There were knives. A whole lot of knives. So I removed them. I also hid the ginormous bottle of vodka and the supersized Bushmills. Then, there were onions. For some reason, the presence of onions bothered me, so I move those, too. What I failed to remove, however, was the giant plaster pelican sitting on top of my refrigerator. My mother gave me that pelican as a gift with a note attached that read, "Please do not pick me up by my head." She is somewhat of an enigma. And now, there it is, in my first foray into making a science video, one that now has been featured in, you know, pretty important places. I think I will call him Alfred.
Anyway, something happened. I don't remember what...did my children come running in? Did the traffic noise outside my window suddenly escalate? I don't know. What I do know is that somehow, in that interval, I could not get my laptop camera to the same settings I'd been using. I'm a biologist, dammit, not a videographer. Clearly. Yet, for whatever reason, I felt compelled to get in these final few phrases:
It's as though Ed Wood had decided to make an evolution video, isn't it?
Given what to me was a near video debacle, I can't say how grateful I am to the SCOPE team of Matt Shipman, David Wescott, Jamie Vernon, Kevin Zelnio, and Andrea Kuszewski for not making me look like a complete idiot in what they included in the final product, even if others think we all come across as dutiful little show mares. And I also thank them and the 15 other women who participated for talkin' 'bout evolution in ways that non-scientists might understand.
More on the video and its genesis from David Wescott and Matt Shipman (@ the Def Shepherd blog).
