Collaborative Research: Cultural Production in the Digital Age ?Defining a New Research Agenda

在过去，由于生产资源和能力的相对匮乏，媒体只能为公民提供狭窄的文化生产渠道。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的设备的日益普及，宽带互联网连接在美国和整个后工业化世界的渗透，以及服务器端应用程序的兴起，这些都迫使研究人员重新考虑文化生产和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，他们已经在这一领域提出了令人信服的问题，沿着技术设计师，他们的工具干预了当前的文化生产实践。该小组将建立一个为期一年的虚拟研究小组，在两端举行面对面会议，以开发重要的跨学科工具，更好地了解数字技术和文化生产在当代社会背景下的相互作用。 我们的目标是实现五个目标：1）促进跨学科对话，讨论文化生产及其与数字技术、社会技术网络和文化的关系; 2）绘制研究的核心领域，确定合作机会和现有的研究差距; 3）设想替代信息平台，以研讨会获得的见解为基础，旨在服务和询问社会范围内的公众表达; 4）建立一个公共的在线资源，将更广泛的学者聚集在一起，类似地从事这些问题; 5）通过将研究生纳入相关的论文项目，促进研究生的培养。该项目将有助于科学和技术研究，游戏研究，和其他社会科学对数字文化生产的研究。该项目更广泛的影响将包括为今后的实证研究提出理论贡献和建议。研究结果将在网上公布，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》，并在编辑后的书中出版。

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.