Collaborative Research: Workshops on Cultural Production in the Digital Age

在过去，由于生产资源和能力的相对匮乏，媒体只能提供狭窄的渠道，让公民参与文化生产。公共话语越来越像那些狭窄的渠道，有时是有问题的。今天，个人电脑、内容制作软件和移动设备的日益普及，宽带互联网连接在美国和整个后工业世界的渗透，以及将内容传播到庞大的社会信息网络的服务器端应用程序的兴起，都迫使研究人员重新考虑文化生产与公共话语之间的关系。这个项目将聚集一小群来自不同学科背景的国际教师和研究生，他们已经在这个领域提出了令人信服的问题，以及技术设计师，他们的工具干预了当前的文化生产实践。该小组将成立一个为期一年的虚拟研究小组，以面对面的会议为基础，以开发重要的跨学科工具，以便更好地理解当代社会背景下数字技术和文化生产的相互作用。我们的目标是实现五个目标：1)促进关于文化生产及其与数字技术、社会技术网络和文化之间关系的跨学科对话；2)绘制核心研究领域，确定合作机会和现有研究差距；3)基于研讨会的见解，设想可替代的信息平台，旨在服务和质疑社会范围内的公共表达；4)建立一个公共的在线资源，将更多同样从事这些问题的学者聚集在一起；5)促进研究生的培养，将研究生纳入相关的论文项目。该项目将有助于对数字文化生产的科学技术研究、游戏研究和其他社会科学探究。该项目更广泛的影响将包括理论贡献的发展和对未来实证研究的建议。结果将在网上公布，在专业会议上发表，提交给选定的期刊，如新媒体与社会，信息社会和融合，并出版在一本编辑好的书中。

In the past, the relative scarcity of production resources and capacities meant that media could offer only narrow channels by which citizens could engage in cultural production. That public discourse increasingly came to resemble those narrow channels, in sometimes problematic ways. Today, the ever increasing ubiquity of personal computers, content production software, and mobile devices, the penetration of broadband internet connections both in the United States and across the post-industrial world, and the rise of server-side applications for circulating content to vast social information networks, all have forced researchers to reconsider this relationship between cultural production and public discourse. This project will assemble a small group of international faculty and graduate students from a mix of disciplinary backgrounds who are already asking compelling questions in this area, along with technology designers whose tools intervene in current cultural production practices. This group will establish a virtual research group for one year, anchored by face-to-face meetings at either end, in order to develop vital, inter-disciplinary tools for better understanding the interplay of digital technologies and cultural production in contemporary social contexts. We aim to meet five objectives:1) Foster interdisciplinary dialogue on issues of cultural production and its relationship to digital technology, socio-technical networks, and cultures; 2) map core areas of research and identify collaborative opportunities and existing research gaps; 3) Envision alternative information platforms premised on the insights gained in the workshop, designed both to serve and interrogate public expression on a societal scale; 4) produce a public, online resource that will draw together a wider set of scholars similarly engaged in these questions; and, 5) facilitate graduate student training, by including graduate students with relevant dissertation projects.The project will contribute to science and technology studies, games studies, and other social science inquiry into digital cultural production. The project's broader impact will include the development of theoretical contributions and proposals for future empirical research. Results will be available online, presented at professional meetings, submitted to selected journals, such as New Media and Society, The Information Society, and Convergence, and published in an edited book.