a minipost
Last night I was thinking about something a favorite teacher taught me about communication. I was lucky enough to have had two excellent teachers in high school. I had one of them, Joe Wolff, in three classes: world history, the history of religion, and western philosophy. I visited him on my trips back to Great Falls when I was in college and would talk with him and his wife until the small hours of the morning. So many learnings, but one still keeps me thinking.
Widely read, he said there were any number of bad communicators. but you could break the good ones into three categories:
The explainers The good ones make the subject clear and easy to understand. It's a high bar - something I think I can do every now and again. It's the domain of very good textbooks.
The elucidators Everything good explainers are, but they manage to transport the reader (or listener or viewer) to a much deeper place. An understanding. They connect ideas and information from far and wide to illuminate the subject. They challenge you to think and connect. They inspire. They also happen to be rarer than good explainers and their value is much greater. I aspire to be one, but fall short.
The enchanters They possess the skills of the first two have, but communicate with a brilliance that gives you a deep insight almost as if by magic while making it look easy. They provide a sense of what it is to think deeply and discover a bit of something both deep and exciting. They offer an integration of thought that goes beyond inspiration. They are so rare!
There are examples in many fields including (perhaps especially including) art and music. All three require thought and work on the part of their audience, but they inspire you to dig in.
I'm not going to list examples - that's a task I leave for you to think about.
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