Discourse or Document?Issues of adopting Emerging Digital Genres for

Scholarly Communication

Dr. des. Cornelius Puschmann, M.A.Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf

cornelius.puschmann@uni-duesseldorf.de

Scientific Writing and New Patterns of Scientific Communication5th International Conference on e-Social Science

Maternushaus, Cologne24 June 2009

My prior research and this presentation

● I study linguistic aspects of scholarly communication (blogs, microblogs, wikis)

● this presentation addresses● conceptualizations of paper-based vs. digital communication● how differences in these conceptualizations are linguistically reflected● what the implications are for scholarly communication

Initial observations

● scholarly communication shaped by the technology

● digital scholarly communication at the moment largely imitates pre-digital forms (“e-journals”,

“e-books” etc)

● we are increasingly shedding the constraints of pre-digital metaphors (Web 2.0)

● but cultural conventions follow technology only slowly (“cultural lag”)

Terminology: digital natives vs. digital immigrants

It is amazing to me how in all the hoopla and debate these days about the decline of education in

the US we ignore the most fundamental of its causes. Our students have changed radically.

Today’s students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach.

- Prensky (2001)

Terminology: the long tail

For too long we've been suffering the tyranny of

lowest-common-denominator fare, subjected to

brain-dead summer blockbusters and

manufactured pop. Why? Economics. Many of our

assumptions about popular taste are actually

artifacts of poor supply-and-demand matching -

a market response to inefficient distribution.

The main problem, [...] is that we live in the

physical world.

- Anderson (2004)

Terminology: conceptually spoken vs. conceptually written language

conceptually spoken language

● prototype: face-to-face communication

● conversation

● phone call

● instant messaging/Twitter

● planned speeches

● …

= prototype is medially spoken, co-spatial,

synchronous, dialogical

conceptually written language

● prototype: paper document

● reference works

● legal texts

● newspapers

● academic articles

● …

= prototype is medially written, non-co-

spatial, asynchronous, monological

Koch & Oesterreicher (1994)

Terminology: conceptual metaphors

There is a cognitive and cross-linguistic tendency to interpret new, abstract, complex and non-

physical concepts in terms of familiar, concrete, simple(r) and tangible concepts.

An example: THEORIES (AND ARGUMENTS) ARE BUILDINGS

● Is that the foundation for your theory?

● The theory needs more support.

● The argument is shaky.

● We need some more facts or the argument will fall apart.

● We need to construct a strong argument for that.

- Lakoff and Johnson (1980)

A (very brief) history of scholarly publishing

Science blogging: UsefulChem

To clear up confusion, I will use the term Open

Notebook Science, which has not yet suffered

meme mutation. By this I mean that there is a

URL to a laboratory notebook that is freely

available and indexed on common search

engines. It does not necessarily have to look

like a paper notebook but it is essential that all

of the information available to the researchers

to make their conclusions is equally available

to the rest of the world. Basically, no insider

information.

- Bradley 2006

Lab wikis: OpenWetWare

OpenWetWare is an effort to promote

the sharing of information, know-how,

and wisdom among researchers and

groups who are working in biology &

biological engineering.

- OpenWetWare.org

arXiv and Twitter mashups: TweprintsTweprints aims to collect and

organise the arXiv papers

mentioned on Twitter.

- orbitingfrog.com/arxiv

Video abstracts: Journal of Number Theory

“The WWW allows us to personalize our

papers in ways never before possible...

you can present the motivational history

of the research contained in your

article.”

- David Goss, editor

Visualizing and embedding data: ManyEyes/Wordle

Rather than representing the end result of the

experiment, the data from my experiments

inspired more sharply focused readings of the

texts. A visualization like the Wordle image of

under- and overrepresented words should not,

and really cannot, stand as evidence in proving

a hypothesis. The visualization is simply not

empirical in nature. In a way, word clouds, as

visual representations of criticism, can be seen

as art useful in representing other modes of

art. And, as with any instance of artistic

representation, they remain open to

interpretation.

- Steger (2009)

How can we characterize what is happening?

In comparison to paper-based scholarship, digital scholarly information is...

● disseminated more rapidly and in smaller chunks (e.g. Twitter)

● more strongly personalized (e.g. blogs)

● more strongly contextualized (when/by whom is smth. created?)

● more likely to be non-textual (audio, video, interactive models, ...)

From the Object Web to the Social Web

1990s 2009

Object Web metaphors vs. Social Web metaphors

Object Web metaphors

● page

● site

● browse

● “on” the Internet

● “go to” a website

● …

= Web is a physical space filled with

objects

Social Web metaphors

● profile

● friend

● follow

● poke

● “X says in her blog...”

● …

= Web is a socio-communicative

interaction between people

What has motivated the shift of metaphors?

Object Web

● bound to specific devices and

limited contexts

● limited Internet connectivity

● communication is asynchronous

● “conveyer-belt interpretation”

● Net speeds up existing practices,

doesn't change them

Social Web

● Internet no longer bound to PC and

work settings

● Internet connectivity is ubiquitous

● communication is synchronous

● content is created and lives online

● new practices arise

Speaking vs. writing

spontaneous planned

discursive monologic

qualified constative

“writing”“speaking”

transient persistent

contextual non-contextual

Frequencies words in academic papers and blogs

Academic papers in linguistics: the, of, and, in, a, to, is, that, universal, this, for,

implicatures, inferences, not, read, scalar, as, are, choice, free

Academic blog entries: the, to, a, and, of, is, in, that, I, it, are, on, as, be, but, for, not, with,

you, this

(both registers are much more diverse than this simple example can show, but:)

● lexis in academic papers is complex and abstract

● blogs assign discourse roles (“I”, “you”)

At the heart of scholarship: authority

● scholarly communication is dependent on authority

● paper-based scholarly communication supports authoritative voice, because● traditional publishing is mandated by institutions● printed texts are permanent and immutable● long, uninterrupted monologues naturally create authority ● author can be linguistically distant from his writing (no first person, no personal verbs etc)● writing fosters specific conventions and code (formulaic language, jargon) that are

exclusive to a group

● control, permanence, objectivity, exclusivity are so far crucial to scholarly authority

Issues

● especially those disciplines where “the data does not speak” (=Humanities) are potentially

challenged in their authority

● impact on research and publishing practices likely to be significant in those disciplines● more collaboration● more stringent methodology● more empiricism, data● new ways and skills needed to establish authority

Likely future forms

● less uninterrupted monologue

● pastiches of media and voices

● meta-information likely to be encoded and exploited (who/when/where) because it simplifies

writing and reading

● permanent, “interpersonal-style” narrative?

● Google Wave?

Thanks for listening! Thanks for listening!

Discourse or Document?Issues of adopting Emerging Digital Genres for

Scholarly Communication

Dr. des. Cornelius Puschmann, M.A.Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf

cornelius.puschmann@uni-duesseldorf.de

Scientific Writing and New Patterns of Scientific Communication5th International Conference on e-Social Science

Maternushaus, Cologne24 June 2009