Episode 108 - Listen To This If… You need to write about a topic that’s been done to death

Transcript

Jen (00:00:14)

Hello and welcome to another episode of Listen to This If…. These are five-minute episodes where Michael and I come together. We are the team from Let's Talk SciComm. And we try and just have a quick chat about something that you might be currently stuck on. So we hope to give you a pep talk. We hope to give you a couple of new ideas to try out as you navigate this problem.

So Michael, what we are talking about today is what do you do when you've been asked or told to write about a topic that you feel has just been done to death and so many people have already written about it and there's just nothing new to say.

Michael (00:00:49)

Hmm... It kind of reminds me of a food analogy which I'm going to try and weave in here. It's kind of almost like you know, someone asks you to make a, you know, a cheese toastie. And you know, cheese toasties have been done to death. And maybe if you had to eat cheese toasties for a full week, you know, it might be boring.

But my advice is to freshen it up. You know, try and find something fresh, something slightly different that you can add to that topic. So you know, you've got the topic. But then maybe you've got you know, maybe a unique analogy that hasn't been done before. Maybe you've got a personal story that hasn't been done before.

You know, if you were making toasties here, maybe that'd be make a cheese toasty, but maybe you put like chili on it one day. Maybe you put mushrooms on it, you know, another day to kind of freshen it up a little bit. So I think that would be my advice.

You probably... In order to do that, you probably need to kind of understand what other people have been saying about that topic to understand you know, are you just going to be repeating an analogy that's been used quite a lot. Because you want to make sure that your little kind of fresh addition is going to be unique.

And maybe that should be part of the opening, you know, part of the headline to grab people's attention. And then just make sure, you know, you do it well. You know, maybe time has passed since you know, that... That you know, maybe you want to talk about kind of progress that's been made on this topic or you know, future directions.

Because, you know, that stuff does rapidly change, what the future is going to look like does change. So yeah, I think that's my advice. Freshen it up.

Jen (00:02:36)

Now I'm just distracted thinking about a cheese toastie with beetroot relish. I love beetroot relish.

Michael (00:02:37)

There you go, beetroot relish. That's a great way of freshening it up.

Jen (00:02:48)

So I think my tip... I think that's all absolutely right, Michael. I couldn't agree more, to try and bring something different to the conversation.

I think I would encourage you to reflect on the fact that you know that lots and lots and lots of people have written about this, cause you're the one who's been Googling it and reading all the things that everyone else has written, but it's highly unlikely that your audience has also read all of these things.

So it's not like for them, the thing that you're writing is going to be the 5th or 10th or 15th thing they're reading on the topic. It could well be the first thing that they're reading on the topic.

So I think it's all about challenging your attitude. And if your attitude is, Oh, this is so boring and it's all been said before, and you know, I won't go over the basics. Remember that for your reader, this could absolutely be the first time they're ever reading this thing.

So don't give it, you know, don't let it be an excuse to not write very clearly, very succinctly. Do all of the things that you would normally write, you know, use or do when you're writing. And like you said, just make sure you do it really really really well.

And I guess hopefully it's a topic that you find interesting in some way. You know, I think it's really difficult if you're being forced to write something. You know, for an assessment task or whatever that you just have zero interest in. In that case, yeah, this is a much much harder topic for sure.

And maybe listen to our podcast about procrastination, but assuming that there's something in the topic that you find interesting or intriguing, I would say really lean into that. Because the thing that you find interesting, you are going to be able to make really come to life for your audience.

So of course, cover the basics, make sure people have the background they need to know to understand the topic. But then really lean into and explore the thing that you find the most interesting, because that will make your piece interesting to everybody who reads it.

And just recognise that yeah, you are you, you are a different writer to everybody else. Your audience is almost certainly a different audience to everybody else. It's not like the people who are going to be reading it have you know, read all of the other things, as I said.

So yeah, I guess maybe my main tip is just to challenge your, your assumptions and to challenge your sense of, Oh, this is going to be so boring. Everyone's already done this. And flip that into What exciting opportunity do I have to bring this topic in a fresh light, as you say, `to my particular audience, bringing my personal experience and knowledge and background to it and something that I find interesting or I have particular insight into`.

So I think you can make any topic fresh again, right?

Michael (00:05:11)

Yeah, of course.

Jen (00:05:11)

I really think you can.

Michael (00:05:12)

Yeah. And I mean, there's probably a reason why it's been written a lot about. Maybe it's because a lot of people have a general interest in that topic.

So you probably don't need to work as hard as you think you do.

Jen (00:05:24)

Exactly. Yeah. Couldn't agree more. So go grab a cheese toasty, add whatever condiments you like and get writing.

Because you're, you're you know, you're setting yourself up to fail for absolutely no reason if you think that you can't bring something new to this.

Michael (00:05:37)

That's right. Bon appetit.

Michael (00:05:55)

Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoyed the episode and a huge thanks to our production team, Steven Tang and Madeleine Kelly.

That's it for this week. See ya.