Tag: Communication

Books

Book 977: Don’t Think of an Elephant! – George Lakoff

Geoff W

Book cover of "Don't Think of an Elephant!" with Amazon Affiliate linkI had to read this for a communications course earlier this fall and when I read it I blazed through it very quickly and knew I wanted to revisit it as soon as the semester was done. So I left it as “reading” in my Goodreads for over a month and finally got around to re-reading it and genuinely absorbing it.

I’m glad I re-read it, some of it was pretty obvious and some of it clearly explained things like why “climate change” is the predominant word of choice instead of “global warming.” My professor said that many of his students said they can’t watch the news anymore after reading this, and while I can still watch it I’m much more aware of the framing and terminology newscasters/journalists use than before.

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Books, Professional Development

Book 969: The Art of Communicating – Thích Nhất Hạnh

Geoff W

Book cover of "The Art of Communicating" with Amazon Affiliate linkI had to read this for a course I’m talking about the art of brave communication. We only had to read the first couple of chapters, but I found it to be an approachable and relatively easy read so kept going.

Where Hanh excelled was in his simple writing. For the most part, there were no overwrought metaphors or awkward analogies. There was one at the end that I’ll get to, but I think it’s a religious thing and it just fell flat for me.

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Books

Book 517: The Secret Diary of Lizzie Bennet – Bernie Su and Kate Rorick

Geoff W

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

That counts as a review right?

There’s no real reason to review this book – I mean I loved it, but I also loved the YouTube series – see below for a link GO WATCH IT NOW! There’s a link to the playlist at the end of this post. Seriously, forget my review go get sucked into the drama that is Pride and Prejudice reimagined as a master’s thesis project in the form of a vlog: The Lizzie Bennet Diaries. I mean it was the FIRST digital series to win an Emmy. AN EMMY people—that’s like legit.

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ARC, Books, Professional Development

Book 507: If I Understood You, Would I Have This Look on My Face? – Alan Alda

Geoff W

Only two ARC/Galleys left and I am all caught up! The same publicist who sent me Finally Out reached out about this book and the title had enough humor in it I figured it was worth a shot.* I enjoyed this so much more than I thought I would!

What Alan Alda—I didn’t even recognize him from M*A*S*H (IMDb link), I just recognized his caricature—is doing is what the Plain English Campaign (website) has been trying to do since the late 70s, just through a different venue: improv. Both are trying to get things translated from the indecipherable jargon of science or government into easily relatable language. Alda, has basically made a side career out of this with the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science at Stony Brook University, where the observations he made from his many years on Scientific American Frontiers are put into practice to teach scientists how to talk to non-scientists.

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Books, Personal Project, Professional Development

Book 475: Difficult Conversations – Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen

Geoff W

stone-douglas-bruce-patton-and-sheila-heen-difficult-conversationsNow that it’s been almost a month I figured I might as well catch up on some books. I’ve actually made quite a bit of progress reading this month, given the facts of everything that’s going on and  affects my day-to-day work life (thanks Trump).

This book came to me from my current Human Resources Director when I spoke with her about how not-so-great Miguel Ruiz’s books were. Based on our few previous conversations she was like you should try this one because it’s more of a practical guide and less “worldly wisdom.” And boy was she right!

Even though the two books say basically the same thing, this one was so much easier to identify with and take action points away from it. This could have to do with the fact it was written by a group of Harvard University associated individuals, or it could also have to do with the fact that it was less spiritual and more practical.

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