In order to introduce the public to science in a combination of comedy and education, Dr. Anca Constantin and Dr. Klebert Feitosa host the event Demystifying the Expert. The program brings together a guest speaker, who is an expert in their field of science, and comedians from JMU’s New & Improv’d, who attempt to “demystify the expert.” Questions, games, trivia and improvised skits all contribute to the fun as the audience learns about the expert’s work. Examples of previous Demystifying the Expert events can be found here, here, here, here, here, and here.
The first Demystifying the Expert of the Fall Semester 2017 was held on October 5th at Taylor Down Under. The professor for this session was Dr. Geary Albright, an astrophysicist who has been at JMU since 2007, and received the title of General Education Professor of the Year for 2017.
The members of JMU’s New and Imrpov’d who participated in the event were Naomi Stuart, a sophomore English major, Alex Jacobs, a senior Communications and Philosophy double major, and Noah Etka a sophomore computer science major.
First, the comedians played twenty questions to try to figure out what it is that Dr. Albright studies. They quickly determined, based on a random guess from Noah Etka, that Dr. Albright did something in the realm of astronomy. Dr. Albright explained how he studies binary star systems and talked about Medusa’s eye, which is a star in the night sky that dims and brightens regularly, which modern astronomers have determined is because it is an eclipsing binary star system.
First, the comedians played twenty questions to try to figure out what it is that Dr. Albright studies. They quickly determined, based on a random guess from Noah Etka, that Dr. Albright did something in the realm of astronomy. Dr. Albright explained how he studies binary star systems and talked about Medusa’s eye, which is a star in the night sky that dims and brightens regularly, which modern astronomers have determined is because it is an eclipsing binary star system.
After this game was “In the News,” where the comedians guessed missing words in several news headlines related to Dr. Albright’s field of research.
The jargon game came next, which asks the comedians to try to guess the meaning of specific acronyms or jargon vocabulary from the expert’s knowledge. They were asked to define terms such as white dwarf and red giant. The comedians did a surprisingly good job at knowing that these were terms from stars’ life cycles, though there was some debate on which part of the life cycle each of these terms came from.
During the “Two Truths and Lie” game, the comedians learned about Dr. Albright’s life outside of astrophysics. In this section, the comedians and audience learned that Dr. Albright plays the banjo. The comedians were delighted to find out that he carries around small fish that, when put in the palm of your hand, will do something such as curl into itself, or lay flat, and based on the action of the fish it tells you the future. There is a list on the package of the fish of the actions it can make and its meanings.
Finally, the night was capped off in the “Scenes from a Hat” game, in which the comedians take out quotes from a bag and read them out loud, integrating them into their skit about a day in Dr.
Albright’s classroom. For this round, Noah portrayed Dr. Albright and Alex and Naomi were supposed to be his students coming to his office for help.
Albright’s classroom. For this round, Noah portrayed Dr. Albright and Alex and Naomi were supposed to be his students coming to his office for help.
The night proved to be a success. It was entertaining, drew many laughs from the audience, but was also educational and informative.
