Formats and Practices of Media Studies in the Age of Digital and Social Networks: An Ethnographic and Netnographic Study

Digital and social media transform scholarly cultures. While Science and Technology Studies mostly focus on the Natural Sciences, the qualitatively grounded focus of this project lies on the digitally-induced transformations within the Humanities, using the discipline of German (Cultural) Media Studies (Schröter 2016) as a case in point. Harnessing the media-reflexive capabilities of Media Studies scholars, the project investigates common scholarly media and media practices, interviewing actors about their everyday professional life. The first study (A) investigates relevant media of German Media Studies that are currently being used for purposes of research, teaching, publication, evaluation and networking - both on- and offline. The study analyses their aesthetics as well as the conditions of their usage, production, and distribution (Altheide und Schneider 2013; Baym 2010).The second study’s (B) focus lies on scholarly media practices and related problems and aims to gain insight into academics’ handling of new media within their professional surroundings: Which means of media production and distribution do they use? Which roles do digital feedback and forms of attention play in the context of their work? Which aspects of scholarly competition can be observed in social networks? Which problems do scholars perceive to be a part of the socially networked environment and which narratives and interpretations dominate? The analysis draws on a 1.5 years long ethnographic/netnographic (Kozinets 2010) study with 40 ethnographic and problem-focused interviews. Their goal is to document how German Media Studies scholars reflect(ed) on new media and transformations of scholarly culture at the beginning of the 21st century and to make these documents available to other researchers through collaborating with the Marburg University Media Studies repository (media/rep/) in storing and making accessible those field data and interviews that are considered to be of long-term value to the research community.The project strives to add a perspective to the ethnographic studies of science that is currently underrepresented – combining a Media & Cultural Studies approach with sociological empirical research and focusing on a discipline from the Humanities rather than the Natural Sciences. It also contributes to the preservation of Media Studies-related research data.The project also aims to compile and evaluate the growing body of scholarly literature from various disciplines focusing on digitally and socially networked scholarship paying special attention to the aspect of mediality.

数字和社交媒体改变了科学文化。尽管科学和技术研究主要集中在自然科学上，但该项目的定性扎根重点在于人文科学内部的数字诱导的转变，使用德语（文化）媒体研究学科（Schröter2016）作为一个例子。该项目利用媒体研究学者的媒体反射能力，调查了普通的科学媒体和媒体实践，并就他们的日常职业生活采访了演员。第一项研究（a）调查了德国媒体研究的相关媒体，这些研究目前用于研究，教学，出版，评估和网络 - 在线和离线。该研究分析了他们的美学以及其使用，生产和分销的条件（Altheide und Schneider 2013; Baym 2010）。第二项研究的重点在于学术媒体实践和相关问题，并旨在洞悉学者在其专业周围的新媒体处理：他们的专业生产和分发如何使用？数字反馈和关注形式在其工作背景下发挥了哪些角色？在社交网络中可以观察到科学竞争的哪些方面？学者认为哪些问题成为社会网络环境的一部分，以及哪些叙述和解释占主导地位？该分析借鉴了1。5年的民族志/网络志（Kozinets 2010）研究，并进行了40次民族志和以问题为中心的访谈。他们的目标是记录德国媒体研究学者如何在21世纪初对新媒体和科学文化的转变进行反映（ED），并通过与马尔堡大学媒体研究存储库（Media/rep/）合作，使其他研究人员可以将这些文档用于存储，并在这些现场数据和访问中添加了一项研究，以添加一项项目。代表性不足 - 将媒体和文化研究方法与社会学经验研究结合在一起，并专注于人文学科而不是自然科学的学科。它还为与媒体研究相关的研究数据提供了贡献。该项目还旨在汇编和评估来自各个学科的科学文献的不断增长的体系，这些学科的重点是数字和社会网络奖学金，以特别关注内侧的方面。