Viewing Publications Through an Anthropological Lens: Arab Publications on Educational Technology as a Case Study

Abdulrahman Essa Al Lily ()
Additional contact information
Abdulrahman Essa Al Lily: King Faisal University

Journal of the Knowledge Economy, 2019, vol. 10, issue 1, No 14, 274 pages

Abstract: Abstract This study asks the philosophical question: is the activity of academic authoring influenced by historical occasions and cultural norms? It uses Arab studies in the field of educational technology to examine this question. The study first generated a list of all the publications since the foundation of this field (i.e. a list of around 4000 academic writings). It then derived descriptive statistics from this list. It then interviewed 27 academics, who were asked to help interpret these statistics. The main finding was that the publishing activity was partially influenced by the wider Arab culture and its history. This suggests that publications (and, perhaps, any other forms of ‘achievement’) can be ‘read’ as records of wider social cultures and historical events, almost in the same way that archaeologists and geologists read landscapes and what remains of ancient societies. Publications should be analysed as ‘inscribed spaces’ on which a certain society ‘writes’ their presence, concerns and matters. Publications should be seen as having their own ‘biographies’ that detail the cultural, social, economic and political features of the milieu in which publications are written. Bearing this implication in mind, it is well worth unearthing the ‘archaeological’ and ‘geological’ dimensions of academic publications.

Keywords: History; Information; Knowledge; Archaeology; Anthropology; Educational technology; Publication (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s13132-017-0465-1 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:jknowl:v:10:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1007_s13132-017-0465-1

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/13132

DOI: 10.1007/s13132-017-0465-1

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of the Knowledge Economy is currently edited by Elias G. Carayannis

More articles in Journal of the Knowledge Economy from Springer, Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().