| Home | About | Subscribe | Search | Member Area |
Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 33, No. 744.
Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
Hosted by King's Digital Lab
www.dhhumanist.org
Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
[1] From: Francois Lachance
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu (24)
[2] From: Tim Smithers
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu (130)
[3] From: Gabriel Egan
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu (38)
[4] From: Kathleen Fitzpatrick
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu (41)
[5] From: Henry Schaffer
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu (16)
--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2020-04-09 00:27:40+00:00
From: Francois Lachance
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu
Weighing in to this debate with one word: coterie.
Francois Lachance
Scholar-at-large
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~lachance
https://berneval.hcommons.org
to think is often to sort, to store and to shuffle: humble, embodied tasks
> Date: 2020-04-07 23:57:30+00:00
> From: Jim Rovira
> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.737: on using academia.edu
>
> [...]
>
> No author has ever had anything other than sales numbers until very
> recently, which means no author could ever know if a reader has ever
> actually read his or her work, much less if they read it carefully or
> intelligently. That kind of knowledge has been very rarely had by authors
> throughout the entire history of the written word.
--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2020-04-08 15:15:20+00:00
From: Tim Smithers
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu
Dear Jim,
You write, concerning Academia.edu.
"... you seem to be holding the site to a standard that
doesn't exist for any other publication format in the
entire history of publications, from the existence of
scrolls to codexes to printed books to the internet."
No, I don't think so. Like I said, I'm not against
Academia.edu. Nor have I proposed or suggested that
Academia.edu do anything different from what it does now. My
point is not about what Academia.edu does, or doesn't do.
It's about what people do with the numbers they can get from
Academia.edu, or similar websites.
You go on to write.
"... No author has ever had anything other than sales
numbers until very recently, which means no author could
ever know if a reader has ever actually read his or her
work, much less if they read it carefully or intelligently.
That kind of knowledge has been very rarely had by authors
throughout the entire history of the written word. I'm
unsure why you think this site can or even should provide
that kind of information."
I don't think Academia.edu should provide such information
about real readers and how much they have really read, or,
indeed anything else that can be said about what real readers
do. I don't think Academia.edu can do this. That's my point.
Sales numbers and the numbers we can get from Academia.edu
aren't readers, and don't tell us anything very much about
real readers: these numbers aren't an audience. As for you,
it is, in my experience, rare to know who real readers are and
what they gain from their reading. That's how the human world
of readers works, it seems to me. And I'm not expecting, nor
demanding, it to be made otherwise, by Academia.edu or
anything else. I'm quite happy to only occasionally come
across a real reader and get to know something about them and
their reading.
You go onto write.
"Academia.edu doesn't dehumanize a process that was
previously humanized, because the process was never
humanized as you describe to begin with. For the most
part, no author has ever known who reads his or her work
or how they read it."
I didn't say Academia.edu dehumanises anything. I didn't use
this word. I said taking numbers, such as we can get from
Academia.edu, to be telling us about real readers and what
real readers do, "drains humanness" from what is an important
activity that needs human engagement, interest, thinking,
reflexion, response, and more. Collapsing all this humanness
into numbers, and then not caring if the numbers actually
counted any of this humanness taking place, is what I don't
like. It's not Academia.edu that does this. It's people.
Academia.edu just automates the counting needed to generate
the numbers. I'm not against this counting, nor the numbers
that result. I just don't like treating these numbers as
audience. I prefer to treat people as audience, and only
people. My impression is that this what most authors prefer.
If you don't mind, I think I'll leave it there.
Best regards,
Tim
> On 08 Apr 2020, at 15:34, Humanist wrote:
>
> Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 33, No. 741.
> Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
> Hosted by King's Digital Lab
> www.dhhumanist.org
> Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
>
>
> [1] From: Jim Rovira
> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.737: on using academia.edu (36)
>
>
> --[1]------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Date: 2020-04-07 23:57:30+00:00
> From: Jim Rovira
> Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.737: on using academia.edu
>
> Tim --
>
> Thanks for responding. Yes, I am using the paid version of the site, so I
> get more information. I get a list of names and links to profiles. Some of
> these are anonymous, but most of them are actual names with faces and
> contact information through the site. I have five books out, and I don't
> have that kind of information about any of my readers unless they happen to
> self-identify as one of my readers -- say, I meet them at a conference, or
> they write a review, or they email me or contact me some other way. I do
> get number of pages read or downloads through academia.edu, but it doesn't
> evaluate the care with which my files were read.
>
> Honestly, you seem to be holding the site to a standard that doesn't exist
> for any other publication format in the entire history of publications,
> from the existence of scrolls to codexes to printed books to the internet.
> No author has ever had anything other than sales numbers until very
> recently, which means no author could ever know if a reader has ever
> actually read his or her work, much less if they read it carefully or
> intelligently. That kind of knowledge has been very rarely had by authors
> throughout the entire history of the written word. I'm unsure why you think
> this site can or even should provide that kind of information. Academia.edu
> doesn't dehumanize a process that was previously humanized, because the
> process was never humanized as you describe to begin with. For the most
> part, no author has ever known who reads his or her work or how they read
> it.
>
> I'm trying to work out in my mind the number of readers Shakespeare has had
> compared to the number of readers he personally knew about, and the
> difference is staggering to me. He probably has a sense of the number of
> people who watched performances of his plays during his lifetime, but since
> then? I can't even begin to process what he might have thought of readings
> of his works had he known about them, and more than that -- why it should
> matter to me, except as an insight into Shakespeare himself.
>
> Jim R
>
>
--[3]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2020-04-08 14:11:35+00:00
From: Gabriel Egan
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu
Dear HUMANISTs
Jim Rovira and I won't agree about the website Academia.edu,
but I thought I might comment on his point about Shakespeare
not knowing who his readers were and about the readers
he would acquire after death. "I can't even begin to process
what he might have thought of readings of his works had he
known about them", Jim writes.
My comment is that we can at least be fairly sure that
Shakespeare cared about his future readership. In Sonnet 17
he pictures readers "in time to come" not believing that
any person could be as beautiful as the young man his
verses describe. He imagines the decay of his reputation
for truthfulness using an image of the physical decay of
the documents that convey his words:
So should my papers, yellowed with their age,
Be scorned, like old men of less truth than tongue,
(Sonnet 17.9-10).
Notice he calls them his "papers", not "pages" or "books"
as we might expect if a printed posterity were being
imagined. Shakespeare did become a bestselling author
in print during his lifetime, but it's hard to find
any evidence in his writing that he reflected on his
superstar status as an author. The closest we get is
Thomas Heywood reporting in 1612 that Shakespeare was
"much offended" with the publisher William Jaggard for
printing two of Heywood's poems under Shakespeare's
name.
Regards
Gabriel Egan
--[4]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2020-04-08 14:08:08+00:00
From: Kathleen Fitzpatrick
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu
Dear colleagues,
I'd like to respond to this thought, from maurizio lana:
> 2. if you are in "physics, mathematics, computer science, quantitative
> biology, quantitative finance, statistics, electrical engineering and
> systems science, and economics" your independent, world-known and
> authoritative repository is arXiv. a well thought paper put (published)
> there can become discussed and known all over. take 20 humanists all
> over and ask them what is HC; and take 20 physicians, mathematicians,
> computer scientists, and ask them what is arXiv - and you have a measure
> of the road HC has to do before becoming something that can replace or
> surpass AE and RG. nevertheless HC could and should probably be
> conceived has _having to become_ the "humanists' arXiv". until HC
> remains a small hidden gem it cannot exert a strong positive influence
> in the global humanities community (be it, the community, digital or
> not: publishing and sharing in digital doesn't mean being/having to be a
> digital humanist).
This is certainly true; with 20,000 members worldwide we do not yet have the
traction that AE or RG have. We also do not have their venture capital behind
us. We are a community-oriented, community-based, community-governed network,
however, and as a result we are not answerable to commercial shareholders or
investors; we are instead answerable only to the organizations and individuals
that participate in the network.
That is to say, what it will take for HC to become "the humanists' arXiv"
-- in fact, the phrase I used in my original pitch for the network was
"arXiv, but for the humanities" -- is participation. If YOU join the
network, and you share your content there, our collective efforts become that
much stronger.
We cannot create that influence on our own. We need you and your colleagues to
help us build it.
Kathleen Fitzpatrick // Director of Digital Humanities and Professor of English
Michigan State University // kfitz47@gmail.com // @kfitz
--[5]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2020-04-08 14:05:07+00:00
From: Henry Schaffer
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 33.741: on using academia.edu
re: access to journals and other academic literature
It has been mentioned here that unless one is on the faculty of an academic
institution, that there is little or no access, and that is a compelling
reason for joining academia and/or researchgate. Even apart from Open
Source literature, that statement is incomplete.
Some institutional libraries provide an opportunity for affiliation with
them, often by joining a library member association for a nominal fee, and
then provide online access to their collection, and sometimes borrowing
privileges.
i suggest that this approach should be investigated.
--henry
_______________________________________________
Unsubscribe at: http://dhhumanist.org/Restricted
List posts to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
List info and archives at at: http://dhhumanist.org
Listmember interface at: http://dhhumanist.org/Restricted/
Subscribe at: http://dhhumanist.org/membership_form.php
Editor: Willard McCarty (King's College London, U.K.; Western Sydney University, Australia)
Software designer: Malgosia Askanas (Mind-Crafts)
This site is maintained under a service level agreement by King's Digital Lab.