Disney’s Fantasia as a Model for Science Communication

Browsing the radio for tunes, the classical station that’s always playing is likely skipped. Even taking the broader meaning of this genre of music, the calculated rise and fall of complex and layered melodies of symphonies created throughout the centuries often times do not carry through the speakers into appreciative ears. Similarly, browsing the genres and headlines of news publications suggests that the same thing could be said about science. Certainly, there is a subpopulation that seeks out and follows scientific content, but in general, it can be buried in other headline genres as classical tunes are drowned out by podcasts and pop-music.

There are a few different hypothesis regarding why both are the case. The first one is modern culture is generally neither raised on classical music nor scientific literacy. The second: there is too much prior knowledge that has to be known before really engaging with either content. Both music and science communication strive to convey ideas to an audience, be it through patterns of chordal vibrations or data, respectively. But to be able to symbolically convey ideas to a general public depends on good storytelling. Without a compelling and interesting narrative, most will not engage long enough to stick around for the ending.

Musically, Disney’s Fantasia series (both the original 1940 release and the follow-up in 2000) do a significant service making symphonic music accessible to the general public. Using classic compositions like Bach’s Toccata and Fugue, Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring and Firebird Suite, and Beethoven’s fifth symphony, the huge team of animators and storytellers take poetic license to tell interesting, novel, and visually stunning adventures, bringing quintessential pieces to theaters and homes around the world.

Analogously, if we are to take scientific publications as musical scores, then the animation should be effective public-facing science communication. Thinking only of scientific publications perhaps is a limiting way to think about science discourse, but under the current paradigm of academic scientific publications are the current standard of dissemination be they paywalled, pre-prints, or open access. Access to scientific journals can additionally be more difficult or expensive and less straightforward than turning on the radio or going to a theater. But beyond the practical technicalities and differences of the main sources, it’s the goal of discoursers (composers, animators, and science communicators alike) to share the awe-inspiring experience to the general public and it takes particular storytelling to do that effectively.

 

Tell it how it is

Sometimes, not too much imagination is required to make a story engaging. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, the most famous piece from Fantasia, for example, does not deviate from its original plot. First written in 1797 by German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, it’s a ballad detailing the now familiar story of an old sorcerer leaving his workshop to be attended by his apprentice only to have the rookie cause a magical flood. 100 years later, French composer Paul Dukas transformed the poem into a symphony where it was custom to publish the ballad as part of the orchestral score. Though an already popular concert piece, it did not have a universal audience until Walt Disney cast Mickey Mouse as the foolish apprentice who stole the screen and became instantly recognizable.

There’s something to be said here about the role of the medium used for storytelling. Though music is a universal language, it takes prior knowledge of the poem to hear The Sorcerer’s Apprentice for the first time without accompanying animation and imagine magical broomsticks marching to the beat of bassoons. Analogously, the growing popularity of science podcasts and YouTube videos suggests that audio and visual media may be a more approachable medium to introduce and discuss science to a wider audience.

Telling a story purely through detailing the series of events has its place mainly in more news-y genres. Here, while engagement is important, relaying the particular details is the main concern. Casting a nameless apprentice from Goethe’s poem to Mickey Mouse does not change the story in any meaningful way, nor does it cast further insight into the plot. Similarly, press releases describing new scientific discoveries neither takes away nor adds to the initial finding apart from making it known. But where Mickey Mouse makes The Sorcerer’s Apprentice stick with the greater public, informative news-based science stories typically doesn’t become a cultural icon unless the news is inherently interesting or controversial like the moon landing or the gene-editing tool CRISPR.

 

Making a point of contact

To make something stick, stories can focus on a certain aspect of a story and expand on it through relatability or comedy. Each of these are demonstrated in Disney’s retelling of Rhapsody in Blue and Dance of the Hours, respectively.

Gershwin’s Rhapsody, starting off with the iconic slide of the clarinet up to the first note of the piece, combines classical music and jazz-influenced melodies. Hearing it, it’s not difficult to pick-up the city-like rhythm and imagine the dramatic ebb and flow of the New York city lives Fantasia 2000 animates. Indeed, the piece was inspired by Gershwin’s train journey through the “metropolitan madness” of Boston and hearing the multicultural “kaleidoscope of America.” Watching it, there are an abundance of relatable moments focusing on being dissatisfied with the current state of (city) life be it through unemployment, not being able to follow artistic dreams, and wanting more time with family before the city miraculously draws them out of isolation and turns their lives around with a crescendo.

By piggybacking off of identifiable situations, the science behind the story can become more approachable. This is easier said than done, especially depending on the topic. For example, communicating biological sciences can easily relate to health concerns, a topic to which pop science clings.

Knowing the audience also allows communicators to gear the narrative to be more relatable. Action items aside, talking about climate change with a government official will be an inherently different conversation than if you were talking to a scientist if both conversations are effective and meaningful. Depending on the audience, there are different experiences and values that need to be played toward to keep their interest and attention. While people who have never visited a city might feel whisked away watching the fast-paced city scenes blend with the jazzy music, an experienced city dweller finds home in the pattern conveyed with the story. It’s the familiarity that helps draw people into your story and lets them be more receptive to the message you want to convey. Additionally, by injecting a rhetorical technique that invokes an emotional response called pathos, you may be able to make an impassioned argument to paint the scene and persuade your reader.

Beyond the topic itself having a responsive narrative, analogies provide a general point of contact to the audience. Within a constructed narrative, examples and analogies help bring context and tie concepts to something more tangible. Where some scientific concepts often are not readily accessible, metaphors and comparisons serve as tools that bring topics that would be otherwise abstract to the table to be more digestible. Some examples could be the mitochondria as an “energy factory” for a cell, or the functional groups of a drug being the “arms and legs of a molecule.” These analogies serve as mental models to gain a meaningful understanding of a complex concept.

Comedy done right is an instance of relatability by breaking down barriers and make the audience feel more comfortable with going forward with the story, finding common ground in a laugh. In Fantasia, instead of focusing on how the ballet Dance of the Hours depicts the progression of time, Disney’s team turned towards the ballerinas themselves, converting them into preposterous prancing animals. Parodying classical ballet and the different personalities that embody it, the animators did the legwork to make sure their caricatured choreography was accurate by using ballerinas as their models. This lead to the lifelike, albeit hilarious, precision of lumpy hippos being lifted by scaly reptiles (though the sassy, long-legged ostriches are shown here).

 

Using humor to communicate science also is an effective strategy for audience participation. Though not a standard tool in traditional scientific mediums, humor can have positive effects on attention and engagement in and out of educational contexts. More frequently scientists are stepping out of the lab and into comedy clubs to perform stand-up, forcing them to convey their data through humorous stories. Education should be fun, why can’t it be funny? Amusing narratives also aid in remembering presented facts. By embedding content within an emotionally charged story like a joke, a receptive audience member might remember the science better when the joke lands.

 

Going beyond the story

Sometimes, the most interesting story lies beyond what is obvious. For example, Disney’s retelling of the Firebird Suite tells a completely different story than Stravinsky intended. Like Dance of the Hours, the piece itself was originally composed for a ballet (a “danced symphony”) this time depicting a Russian folk-story about a mystical firebird aiding a prince to break an enchanted spell. However, the animated story shows a spring-time Sprite delicately bringing life to a forest after a long winter. In her gift of life, she also awakens a volcano that angrily and violently destroys everything she had created. Her elk friend comforts her withered form until she’s confident and strong enough to restore breath to the ashen forest. Though a meaningful story of life, death, and rebirth remembering the eruption of Mount St. Helens, there is no explicit mention of an aviary Firebird.

Stories are multifaceted and can have different perspectives. Finding a new angle or spin on a piece brings new life to the whole narrative. Looking in the nooks and crannies of the scene to find something easily overlooked but extremely interesting and enticing.

The Firebird Suite itself applies musical themes of the impressionist style. This movement mainly focused on creating an atmosphere, conveying moods rather than a plot-driven story. Thinking of the sparkling contrasts of light of light and darkness blurred by the paint strokes of artists like Monet or Whistler, musical impressionism has a similar blurry texture with extended tones and blending harmonies. Science, despite misconceptions, can also have this ambiguity. Within each published study, while questions are answered, researchers are left with endless avenues of future directions and more hypothesis to test. It’s within these implications and yet-unthought of applications that interesting stories can be found or brought together.

It’s in this space in particular where science communication can grow. Not by promoting unverified implications, but by exploring the topics and ideas that have not been thoroughly probed. This is the hardest aspect of journalism, scientific or otherwise – finding the story. But it’s here that the most interesting tales are told. It’s from this place of honest exploration into the depths of a field where Carlo Rovelli talks about time, Dag Olav Hessen about carbon, or Ed Yong about domestic dogs. To really find these stories, having an insider perspective helps to both fill in the details along and uncover oddities in their experience.

Getting the story behind the science yields insights that never would have been shared outside the research lab otherwise – from stories of unfortunate failures, the celebratory successes after countless attempts, and the odd one-off experiments that lead to something completely unexpected. Often it can be difficult, even for scientists, to see what’s in front of their eyes. Having a fresh spin on otherwise unwritten stories can result in a beautiful narrative that leaves an emotional impact, not unlike the swelling ending of Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite.

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Sarah is a Ph.D. student in the Program of Chemical Biology at the University of Michigan in the Cianfrocco and Verhey labs. She has produced written articles that have been published on Michigan Science Writers (where she’s also a senior editor and communications director), F1000, and her own blog Annotated Science. She is also the organizing chair of ComSciCon-Michigan 2018. Connect and chat about science, #scicomm, or open access with her on Twitter!