Wissenschaft im Dialog

Was wissen wir über Wissenschaftskommunikation in Südkorea? Eigentlich nichts, wenn wir ehrlich sind. Umso mehr freuen wir uns, dass wir seit Anfang Januar JungSoon Lee bei uns zu Gast haben. Sie arbeitet für The Korea Foundation for the Advancement of Science and Creativity (KOFAC) in Seoul und hat dort u.a. 2015 das Korea Science & Creativity Festival organisiert – ein internationales Science Festival, das über 150.000 Besucher anzog. Nun ist sie für sechs Monate auf Entdeckertour in Deutschland und Europa.

JungSoon, why do you work in Science Communciation?

Science is something that I have been admiring  ever since I was a little girl. I studied children psychology and education, but I have always been curious about fields of scientific research that are unknown to me and it  always  amazed me to discover new topics. 

Currently your are working at KOFAC. What is your job there exactly? 

I am working at the organization named Korea Foundation for the Advancement of Science and Creativity (KOFAC) for international cooperation. KOFAC has many projects aiming to enhance public literacy in science. My job is to support each project by contributing ideas and suggesting collaborations with other organizations overseas. I am always looking for the latest trends in that field. I communicate and cooperate with organizations and institutions associated with these projects. During my work at KOFAC, I was lucky to build networks with different organizations in various countries and cultures. I was impressed especially by the science culture in European countries. Here, science is a part of cultural life. I see people who enjoy science as a cultural activity in a way like I listen to music or view paintings.

And this is what made you curious and encouraged you to find out more about science communication in Europe?

During my stay at Wissenschaft im Dialog, I would like to have the opportunity to take part in projects that I am interested in, like Jugend präsentiert, MS Wissenschaft, Junior Science Cafe or Hack your city. I have broad experience in the field of science communication. And I hope that working at WiD will help me to gain a better understanding of science communication in European countries. How? – By interviewing project managers and by actively taking part in the projects. Just looking at the projects from the outside won’t be enough to fully understand how science communication in Germany and Europe really works. Even taking part only in a smaller scale will help me to learn more about it. I hope I will be able to interact with participants and ask them about their perspectives on science and science communication. Gathering all these informationwill enable me to get to know the structure of each project which will be helpful in order to embed it into Korean culture.

Is there something about science communication here in Germany that caught your attention and that you would describe as “typically German”?

Germany is a country that is leading the new industry throughout the world which caught my attention when I was organizing a conference in Korea last year (the theme was ‘New technologies and Humanity in the 4th Industrial Revolution’). I realized that there is a strong culture of science communication and also public science engagements which evolved during this new Industrial movement. Since KOFAC has a partnership with WiD I thought it would be a great opportunity to learn more about science communication in Germany. Even better at an organization that is a driving power in science communication not only in Germany but also throughout Europe.
In the future, I will profit a lot from this stay, especially when working with international cooperations. My experience in Germany and Europe will be a valuable asset.

And what will we and the German science Communication community learn about Korean science communication? 

I will be writing about Korean science communication on wissenschaftskommunikation.de and I will also give talks at conferences for science communication. By participating in conferences and workshops that are lead by key members of European organizations, I will be able to exchange Korean culture of public science and find ways to build cooperations between these parties and KOFAC.

Along with these activities at WiD, I am planning to visit as many science museums, conferences, seminars and festivals around Europe as possible, so that I can write about them on this blog.

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