Digital Genres in Academic Knowledge Production and Communication: Perspectives and Practices

The rapid development of digital technologies has impacted the ways in which researchers create and communicate knowledge. Novel forms of knowledge communication and researchers’ self-representation online have entailed changing language uses. Luzón and Pérez-Llantada’s (2022) book Digital Genres in Academic Knowledge Production and Communication: Perspectives and Practices published by Multilingual Matters taps into precisely these developments by examining the dynamics between technological innovation and researchers’ communicative practices in the context where ‘knowledge is more than ever in a state of flux and always susceptible to being modified’ (163). Throughout 11 chapters, the authors show how advances in digital technologies and current demands placed on academics drive the emergence of new digital genres and how these genres support the research process, from work-in-progress to evaluation and peer review, and the dissemination of research findings to various local and global audiences. Descriptions and analyses of selected digital genres are accompanied by case studies illustrating how researchers engage in digitally mediated communication practices, and how these practices are both afforded and constrained by the medium.

Theoretically, the book draws on a substantial body of genre analysis research, combining two major approaches: the English for Specific Purposes genre analysis, with a focus on rhetorical structure and communicative purpose, and Rhetorical Genre Studies with a focus on social context. Following the latter school’s seminal conceptualization of genre as a form of social action, digital genres are conceived of as dynamic and ever-changing and are given a great deal of agency throughout the analyses and discussions in the book. Thus, digital genres are seen as multimodal, hybrid, and as forming assemblages with other genres, ‘working together with them to accomplish actions’ (Luzón and Pérez-Llantada 2022: 26). The analyses of generic patterns in the book illustrate how some digital genres used by researchers—such as blogs and video methods articles—stabilize, while others—such as those used for promoting research(er)—come and go. Thus, the genres that are central to academic knowledge communication are seen as having a good chance of survival, whereas those that rely on the latest technological tools to disseminate knowledge to the general public may disappear together with the medium.

Chapters 1–3 lay out the rationale, theoretical framework, and background for the ensuing genre analyses and case studies. The authors emphasize increasing demands for participation and transparency associated with the Open Science movement and show how these demands impact researchers’ communicative practices and language uses. Chapter 3 introduces a theme that becomes recurrent throughout various chapters: how researchers based in different parts of the world make use of English and local languages, standard and non-standard forms, linguistic, and semiotic resources, for different purposes and audiences. This line of inquiry is further developed in the remainder of the book.

Chapters 4–10 zoom in on specific aspects of research communication in different situational circumstances, ranging from constructing identity (chapter 4) to sharing research and interacting with other researchers (Chapters 5 and 6), interacting with different audiences and the general public (Chapters 7–9), and engaging in scholarly debates and research evaluation (Chapter 10). Each of these chapters includes an analysis of a relevant digital genre, followed by a case study of how researchers make use of this genre. Many of the examples in the case studies involve practices of researchers working in the fields of science and technology, but the data for the analyses covers a wide range of disciplines, including the humanities and social sciences.

The genres under investigation include research blogs, open laboratory notebooks, academic social networking sites, microblogging, popular science videos, and blog discussion threads among others. The genre analysis covers aspects such as structural features of the written text (e.g. rhetorical moves), discourse and communicative functions, and multimodal features. The findings are clearly presented in tables and diagrams. This presentation is helpful for readers who are either planning to conduct studies on similar topics or actively resort to the use of a particular genre in their own research communication. I particularly liked the authors’ overviews of various functions in online discourse, for example, ‘communicative functions of comments’ (Table 5.3: 76) or ‘discourse functions in the RG Q&A threads’ (Table 6.1: 88). These findings can be applied more broadly in further research on digitally mediated interaction, not limited to academic genres. The analyses and discussions in Chapters 4–10 also give insight into the complexity of genre networks related to pre- and post-publication activities that are discussed in the context of current socio-economic realities, ranging from international research collaboration to self-promotion. In comparison to the more traditional and established research genres, such as the research article, the analyses of different digital genres point towards a higher degree of reader–writer interaction, manifested, for example, in a frequent use of the personal pronouns ‘I’ and ‘you’, direct appeals to the audience, and explicitly evaluative language. This reader–writer interactivity goes beyond language to include other semiotic resources, such as emojis, images, and sound.

Thus, the analyses in the book provide further support to an earlier observation that digital academic discourse is characterized by a more explicit writer–reader interaction, an increased degree of dialogicity, and increased tolerance towards non-standard language uses (Kuteeva and Mauranen 2018). Luzón and Llantada’s analyses of digital genres show that, even though languages other than English are used to disseminate research findings, particularly to local audiences, English occupies a central position in researchers’ communicative repertoires when it comes to international collaboration. This is where the authors take a critical stance and discuss the limitations resulting from the dominance of English in international knowledge exchanges. In this connection, they also point towards digital affordances, suggesting that machine translation holds the potential to diversify language uses in research communication. This suggestion gains a new dimension in light of the developments in the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI), which have taken place since this book was published.

The authors conclude by outlining pedagogical implications of their research, suggesting that special attention should be paid to developing digital literacies and multimodal composing skills. This training will enable novice researchers to make use of digital genres ‘to perform identities, relate to audiences within and beyond the community and produce and communicate knowledge in new ways’ (181, emphasis in the original). Avenues for future research are presented, both with regard to the affordances and limitations of digital genres. The latter line of inquiry concerns disciplinary differences in the use and range of digital genres, with a perceived trend for greater engagement in the STEM disciplines, as well questions surrounding public engagement, and access and power.

This is truly a state-of-the art book that covers a wide range of digital genres and communicative practices and includes an impressive list of over 400 references. As the authors put it, the book provides ‘an overview of the range of opportunities for the production and dissemination of knowledge that scholars find on the internet’ (171). Throughout different chapters, the reader will learn about affordances of digital technologies, about new genres and new practices, which are generally presented as innovative and forward-looking. As mentioned above, digital genres are given a great deal of agency as they ‘make it possible for scholars to construct multiple identities in order to meet the expectations of various audiences’ (173) and ‘can harness the multimodal affordances of the medium (. . .) to attain their creators’ rhetorical goals’ (174). Students and researchers interested in digital genres and science communication will find many valuable insights into how studies of digital genres and their rhetorical situations can be conducted. Although theory development is not a major concern in this book, the exploratory and explanatory analyses presented here can serve as a basis for moving genre theory forward. Thus, the book makes a significant contribution to genre analysis and paves a way for further research in this area.

In light of recent research trends to decentre the human and language in communicative practices, it would have been interesting to know more about the authors’ perspective on whether it is genres that enable new practices of knowledge production and dissemination or the digital tools that support them. What is the role of human agency vis-à-vis material and spatial affordances? How do researchers make use of technologies in creative and unforeseen ways? In this connection, more could have been said about how digital genres ‘read and write us’ (Jones et al. 2015) as researchers, for example, through algorithms creating profile descriptions and calculating researchers’ impact on academic networking sites, such as the Research Gate.

The authors mainly connect the emergence of digital genres to Open Science movements, but also mention the neoliberal culture and marketization of contemporary academia and the challenges that these trends pose for researchers. As Barton and McCulloch (2018) found, there is a darker side to digitalization, with researchers reporting a sense of loss with regard to agency and autonomy: not all researchers in their study were confident in using social networking sites for self-promotion or comfortable sharing their work in progress on the internet. Latest political and economic developments, for example, concerns about espionage in the research world and ethics surrounding the use of AI, raise new questions for the study of research communication supported by digital genres. Here again, Luzón and Pérez-Llantada’s book provides a valuable point of departure for future studies.

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTOR

Dr. Maria Kuteeva is Professor of English linguistics in the Department of English, Stockholm University. Her research has focused on academic discourse analysis and uses of English in multilingual university settings. She has published two books, five special journal issues, and numerous articles in international peer-reviewed journals. She serves on four editorial boards and is co-editor-in-chief of the AELFE journal Ibérica. Address for correspondence: Stockholm University, Sweden. <[email protected]>

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