Some big news and a milestone for the field - the mythical multi-authored position paper we have started writing almost two years ago has presently taken a presentable form that is ready to be shared with the public! At 57 pages/20K words, it's been described as a monster but it aims to balance the beauty and the beast making up hype studies...
The paper offers a programmatic analysis of the field of critical hype studies, acknowledging and identifying intellectual origins and research and hype literacy agenda, theoretical-methodological frameworks, a summative potpourri of our wide authoring team's empirical works, an attempt to capture our dilemmas and obstacles in pursuing critical hype studies, and...a long list of bibliography.
☸️ For history, our Hype Studies group was initiated during the proceedings of the EASST-4S Conference 2024, when Vassilis Galanos and Andreu Belsunces Gonçalves invited a panel with the precise goal of writing this paper with as many people as possible interested in the concept of hype. The various workings of the group itself (our own conference, presence at panels, other activities) shaped themselves the final format of the paper, as we gained more empirical experience as to what does it mean to study hype critically.
🩷 We hope that this position paper will stand as inspiration across academic, industry, civil society, activist, and other social circles, aiming to become a key reference for future hype-related research. Spread the word!
🎊 It is worth noting that we decided to release the paper independently through the Zenodo depository, using the 21 co-authors' judgements and satisfiable review - we are nevertheless exploring options to publish with a scholarly journal as well - so more news on this to come! It's been a very active week for Hype Studies, so here's to a Friday celebration!
Enjoy:
