The essays collected in Science and the Internet consider the effects of digital technologies on scientific argumentation and the circulation of scientific knowledge. The Internet has transformed how science is practised, and it is accelerating the pace of scientific communication both among peers and to the public. Among peers, the Internet promotes wider and more fruitful collaborative networks. Fully evolved, the scientific article is becoming a portal through which knowledge flows. The scope of peer review is being expanded by the full documentation and immediate scrutiny that the Internet permits. But the Internet's influence extends beyond peer-to-peer communication to the communication of science to wider publics. Institutions must adapt to the just-in-time behaviours of information seekers, and the participatory features of Web 2.0 allow non-experts to comment on scientific research in unprecedented ways. The contributors to Science and the Internet analyse digital developments in science communication from open notebooks and live-blogged experiments to podcasts and citizen-science projects to assess their rhetorical implications.
CHAPTER 1. Revolution or Evolution? Casing the Impact of Digital Media on the Rhetoric of Science
Jonathan Buehl
CHAPTER 2. Learning to “Share Your Science”: The Open Notebook as Textual Object and Dynamic Rhetorical Space
Chad Wickman
CHAPTER 3. The Scientific Journal: Making It New?
Joseph E. Harmon
CHAPTER 4. Evaluation After Publication: Setting the Record Straight in the Sciences
Alan G. Gross
CHAPTER 5. The Online Research Article and the Ecological Basis of New Digital Genres
Christian F. Casper
CHAPTER 6. The Chemistry Liveblogging Event: The Web Refigures Peer Review
Michelle Sidler
CHAPTER 7. Controversies on the Web: The Case of Adult Human Neurogenesis
Jeanne Fahnestock
CHAPTER 8. Radiolab and Parasites: Podcasting Horror and Wonder to Foster Interest in Science
Sarah Wardlaw
CHAPTER 9. Online Visualizations of Natural Disasters and Hazards: The Rhetorical Dynamics of Charting Risk
Charles Kostelnick and John Kostelnick
CHAPTER 10. Meltdowns in the Media: Visualization of Radiation Risk from The Printed Page to the Internet
James Wynn
CHAPTER 11. Intersections: Scientific and Parascientific Communication on the Internet
Ashley R. Kelly and Carolyn R. Miller
CHAPTER 12. Why People Care About Chickens and Other Lessons About Rhetoric, Public Science, and Informal Learning Environments
Stacey Pigg, William Hart-Davidson, Jeff Grabill, and Kirsten Ellenbogen
CHAPTER 13. Afterword: Social Changes in Science Communication: Rattling the Information Chain
Charles Bazerman
Editors’ Biographies
Contributors
Index
Alan Gross is a professor at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. He is the author of The Rhetoric of Science and its extensive revision, Starring the Text. With his long-term collaborator Joseph Harmon, he has written Communicating Science, The Scientific Literature, The Craft of Scientific Communication, and Science from Sight to Insight: How Scientists Illustrate Meaning.
Jonathan Buehl is an associate professor and director of Business and Technical Writing in the Department of English at The Ohio State University. His research interests include the rhetoric of science, visual rhetoric, research methodology, and digital media studies. He is the author of Assembling Arguments: Multimodal Rhetoric and Scientific Discourse and essays (published or forthcoming) in College Composition and Communication and Technical Communication Quarterly.