Diversity in Research Podcast

Social Media in Academic Life - Curse or blessing?

December 16, 2021
Diversity in Research Podcast
Social Media in Academic Life - Curse or blessing?
Show Notes

On the one side, social media is increasingly considered a part of societal and research impact in academia and it is a chance for us all to get in contact with like-minded people we would otherwise never interact with.

On the other side, we know that minority groups are increasingly targets of harassment and attacks on social media and that there are risks to using social media metrics as a measure of success and impact.

To explore these issues we had a fascinating chat with Mark Carrigan about social media in academia. He has recently released the second edition of his book on the topic.

We talked about the role of social media in academia, what the more nuanced take on social media in his second edition of the book looks like, why he took a break from Twitter (and why he is back) and finally we talk about the particular challenges of academics with a minority background on social media.  We think that the concept of ' context collapse' was really interesting and will use that in the future.

We discuss how to get smarter on the challenges of social media in academia and how pushing minority academics to be on social media requires line managers, research managers and administrators to have in-depth knowledge of the consequences.

Learn more:
Mark's latest paper can be found here.  And you can check out his book here.

You can follow Mark on Twitter at @DrMarkCarrigan

Thanks for listening. Do please share, rate, review and follow us on Twitter @Divrespod .

If you're interested in our work with diversity and internationalisation in research please visit www.diversiunity.com

Thanks for listening. Please share, rate, review and follow us on Twitter @Divrespod .

If you're interested in our work with diversity and internationalisation in research, please visit www.diversiunity.com.