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AERA Annual Conference, April 2016 Washington, DC
The Tensions and Conundrums of Public Scholarship (enacted on Social Media)
George Veletsianos Canada Research Chair in Innovative Learning & Technology
Associate Professor Royal Roads University
Scholars are exhorted to go online
Significant actors to consider that foster this encouragement? • Institutions • Popular literature
“Go online” for what purposes?
Scholars are exhorted to go online
Time and time again…
Time and time again…
To navigate these waters…
We need counter-narratives and rich descriptions of the complicated relationships that scholars have with social media.
Some tensions are reported in the literature
1. Time and competing demands re valued artifacts (“I should be writing”)
2. Lack of recognition
Methods
Part of a larger project. 16 interviews + digital artifacts (e.g., blog posts) Scholars at different levels of their career (doctoral student à professor) The majority: in education or educational technology Open coding & constant comparative analysis
Results
3 themes
1. Imagined Audience Mismatch
Many scholars imagine their audiences as communities rather than venues for attracting professional attention. Scholars’ conceptualizations of their audiences differ from those of their universities.
2. Facing unanticipated audiences
Scholars often imagine their audiences as more limited and less diverse than they are in reality à eg students, colleagues, family, peers Unanticipated audiences may cause conflict
3. The conundrum of participation
Context collapse à fragmented identities à How much of myself to share in different spaces? FB: more personal space (BUT, this is changing) Twitter: more professional (related: The fragmented educator. Kimmons & Veletsianos, 2014)
Implications
Scholars’ participation is selective and purposeful The institutional responsibilities Tensions and challenges seem to be (mostly) relational
I’d love your feedback!
This presentation: www.slideshare.com/veletsianos
Publications: www.veletsianos.com/publications
Contact: veletsianos at gmail/Twitter
Thank you
Tension https://flic.kr/p/ao4QVW
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