Comments on: Blogs and academia again

By: Daniel Nexon

Daniel Nexon — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 02:06:59 +0000

It belongs under: “Other Activities.” Why invent some sort of neologism? If your goal is to call attention to your blog, the presence and description of the significance of CT (readership, press mentions, whatever) on your cv will send relevant people to it. If they haven’t already heard of CT. Or don’t read it regularly.

If your goal is to make blogging a respected form of academic output. Well, that’s another matter entirely. Why isn’t the fame, “fortune”, praise of your many fans, and small-but-not-insigificant influence on public discourse a sufficient reward for you?

By: Dave Roberts

Dave Roberts — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 22:24:39 +0000

I’m a non-lawyer, daily consumer of several legal blogs including volokh.com, talkleft.com, glenngreenwald.com. I take a great deal of pleasure in the lively discussions of current legal topics and their intersection with society. Much of it may be several steps down from legal scholarship, but I think it definitely qualifies for Donald Coffin’s community service niche. As a legal “innocent” I can also say that the farther law gets from the vulgar commons, the less relevant it seems. Blogs help bring the ivory tower a little closer to the ground. I think that’s a good thing.

By: Jim Johnson

Jim Johnson — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 02:43:34 +0000

Henry, I think John Quiggin has it right. I would list the things you mention in a distinct category (with a non-self-effacing label of some sort – sorry no suggestion) and claim credit for a lot of labor.
Best,
Jim

By: Katherine

Katherine — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 02:26:18 +0000

“Bah, humbug. Blog triumphalism manifest.
It’s very similar to the e-mail newsletters that have existed for a long time.

Couldn’t you just see one of the law profs who are also big-time TV pundits saying something like “Appearing as a talking-head on TV is sui generis …”

I’d normally agree with you, but Balkin and especially Lederman have really done really rigorous work and true public service on torture & exec. power issues.

By: Sarah Iannarone

Sarah Iannarone — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 01:41:07 +0000

If you consider the blogs “participatory media” or “community media,” then you can consider your publishing accordingly as a dialogue similar to a panel disucssion or community service. I think it is important that scholarship extend beyond the ivory towers of the academy.

By: Hank Roberts

Hank Roberts — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 00:37:50 +0000

How are these things rated? I recently came across this reference: “the Volokh Conspiracy, which I believe is the most popular group academic blog in any field…” and wondered what “popular” means in this context. Consensus?

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 23:36:04 +0000

I report blogging, along with electronic media appearances under community services, but I list newspaper articles and articles in online magazines as publications (separate from refereed journal articles of course).

I’d regard online seminars as being something new enough for a category of their own, although there’s always the option (which we are pursuing at CT) of producing a print version of the results.

By: Trane

Trane — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 22:09:22 +0000

I concur: “Online Seminars” is very good, but then (as Henry seems to indicate) only for on-line activities that require some of the usual initiative, planning, coordination, feed-back and commentary as regular seminars. All those more spontaneous and individual posts, however scholarly and wise they may be, go together with newspaper articles, interviews and so on.

By the way, Ingrid: In the academe of my country, Denmark, ‘unconventional’ is generally a positive term, but most often it is unclear why being unconventional is particularly great. Therefore it is sometimes used to say something positive when you want to be nice to someone (in a review, for instance), but do not have a good reason that relates to the work of that person.

By: Eszter

Eszter — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 22:06:39 +0000

I don’t know if “publishing” is the right heading for this. Ultimately, it’s a mix of the big three: scholarship, teaching and service.. depending on any particular post and related activity. Overall, perhaps service describes it best on the aggregate, but service meant more broadly than just to the profession per se. If you have particular blog posts that you feel are more like scholarship than anything else than perhaps you could include those as individual items under “Other”.

Generally speaking, it seems to me something like this may be better if described in narrative instead of as a one-liner. That is, when you write your tenure statement or if you’re writing your brief bio for a proposal you can mention it there and explain it briefly especially regarding the specifics of the case.

By: Rob St. Amant

Rob St. Amant — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 21:49:47 +0000

I think that there’s no problem in principle in treating blogging as a medium for disseminating scholarly work, but the case has to be made that this is actually the way it works. For example, a skeptic might ask about peer-review aspects of blog entries. Gatekeeping, I think, is a reasonable issue that needs to be addressed. Otherwise a blogger only has, “But it would ruin my professional reputation if I published a bunch of crap!” and people will just shrug (or worse, nod their heads.)

If I were to add blogging to my CV, it would be under some sort of Outreach header rather than under Scholarly Activities. Something that would suggest that it’s a natural part of being a public intellectual today.

By: Patrick S. O'Donnell

Patrick S. O'Donnell — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 21:45:29 +0000

oh my: ‘does indeed…’

By: Patrick S. O'Donnell

Patrick S. O'Donnell — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 21:44:17 +0000

‘is often…’

By: Patrick S. O'Donnell

Patrick S. O'Donnell — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 21:41:04 +0000

Perhaps if we come up with a different term to distinguish more academic and intellectual-oriented blogging from other sorts. The blogging at Opinio Juris, Larry Solum’s Legal Theory, and Balkinization (and of course at CT!), for instance, are often of respectable if not high academic quality and, as noted above (with various publics, expanded pedagogic function, etc.), do indeed blur the boundaries between scholarship, teaching and service.

There’s just something about the word ‘blog’ that gets in the way: a bit of free word association calls to mind bogs, bags, blah, logs, clogs, block, Gog and Magog…well, you get the picture.

By: Donald A. Coffin

Donald A. Coffin — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 21:23:40 +0000

Where I live and work, we might (emphasis on that) count it as “service to the profession” or “community service.” I think of it as something of both, myself.

By: Siva

Siva — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 20:48:24 +0000

“Online seminars” is the consensus. These are real scholarly work in a new environment. There is nothing really “bloggy” about them anyway. They are not spontaneous or organic. They are vetted and coordinated in a scholarly fashion.

Blogs, in general, are no more scholarly than phone conversations. Some can be. Most are not.