Woke up this morning thinking ‘now, what is it that I am forgetting to do?’ then realized it was posting some thoughts on where now/what’s it been like etc for this blog, before our time expires. When I say forget, I think I actually mean ‘put to the back of my mind in the hope that some inspiration will well-up and spring fully formed while I am cooking risotto or something’. It isn’t that I am not willing to apply my grey matter to some of the vast array of fascinating issues/concerns/thoughts touched upon herein. It is rather that I have to admit—and my naïve assumption that people like honesty has got me into trouble many times, so what’s one more!—that I have somewhat mixed/ambivalent/unsure reactions to this mode of working, and I have been baulking/struggling/evading attempts to put this into a coherent statement (and I am not saying that this is coherent or even qualifies as a ‘statement’ – I think Ian’s noun ‘dump’ comes closer to it!).
To explain I am in the process of reading John Law’s (2004) ‘After Method: Mess in social science research’. The book basically explores where the desire and practice of (re)presenting our worlds (in our case, through our research and publications) as singular comes from: and how we might work in and through the multiplicities/slipperiness of things that we all encounter but don’t quite know how to put across, and thus end up silencing—arguments/experiences I am sure you are all familiar with. So this got me thinking of different ways such approaches might work for this blog/project – how we might tell divergent stories, opinions, representations etc in one piece. Boxes within the text? Juxtaposed columns telling different stories of the same ‘thing’? Nice in theory– but then the practicalities kicks in i.e. how do we do it in practice; have we got the time or energy; would it even work and result in something approaching readability; and will the publishers of such a 'respected' journal wear it etc? So once again, the desire for a linear, singular storyline takes hold, and we end up with the same options/ways of working i.e. circulate drafts etc.
I know these are the issues that Ian and others are butting up against all the time in this and other work, hence this blog-experiment. So this isn’t a criticism of this project (in fact, far from it—I really admire Ian’s work and the integrity he exudes). I don’t actually have any pithy conclusions (So I think this posting just proved my, well John Law’s point – the expectation of a pithy/succinct/singular conclusion) I guess it is just that old tension of how we put our conceptual/ethical commitments into practice in an ‘industry’ (for academia is undoubtedly one) that demands certain singular outcomes. So If I do have a finishing point/question it is how we might include the experiences of working in these ways/the challenges of trying to write/think/share differently in a piece that is meant to, knowing how PHG works, be a straight up and down review of the literature. Once again, no conclusions…just more questions!!
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2 comments:
Deciding upon how best to collaborate on a writing project, reminded me of a YouTube video Michael Wesch (Professor of Ethnography, Kansas State University) created for web 2.0. It’s definitely a non-linear approach and highlights some of the possibilities the web has to offer in getting together and sharing ideas/information, as we’ve been doing on the blog... and more. A printed/published work has a limited format, but what can be done online gives some interesting possibilities. I think the blog is just the beginning. Here’s the link to “The Machine is Us/ing Us,” which incidentally was at the number one spot through the Super Bowl last year: http://mediatedcultures.net/mediatedculture.htm It is in fact time consuming, but I think worth the effort. Getting together for dinner is another great idea. Definitely non-linear and tastier ;)
Just adding what I forgot to mention in that last comment... I think a wiki might work well for a draft of 'afters.' It is an easy way to contribute and edit as you go, with multiple participants. So what I imagine is a draft would go up on a wiki site, then those who are invited to edit would add their bits and make comments all at once, rather than to send out drafts via email or on the blog. It's easy to link papers or comments from the blog within the wiki document. Ian can save multiple versions, though the wiki would continually to evolve.
The blog was a nice start in getting us all to share our own work and make a comment or two to what had been said, but I find myself less able to work within its format... I have to click on the comment button, then am redirected to another page and start getting lost. With a wiki, it is all one big entry. It seems like it might be a nice way to edit a paper... or might resemble herding cats... It's just a suggestion. There are many ways to work together, but this one seems very non-hierarchical to me.
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