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Foucault@Wiki: first steps towards a conceptual framework for the analysis of Wiki discourses

Published: 21 August 2006 Publication History

Abstract

In this paper, we examine the discursive situation of Wikipedia. The primary goal is to explore principle ways of analyzing and characterizing the various forms of communicative user interaction using Foucault"s discourse theory. First, the communicative situation of Wikipedia is addressed and a list of possible forms of communication is compiled. Second, the current research on the linguistic features of Wikis, especially Wikipedia, is reviewed. Third, some key issues of Foucault"s theory are explored: the notion of "discourse", the discursive formation, and the methods of archaeology and genealogy, respectively. Finally, first steps towards a qualitative discourse analysis of the English Wikipedia are elaborated. The paper argues, that Wikipedia can be understood as a discursive formation that regulates and structures the production of statements. Most of the discursive regularities named by Foucault are established in the collaborative writing processes of Wikipedia, too. Moreover, the editing processes can be described in Foucault"s terms as discursive knowledge production.

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  • (2020)The space between us: considering online media for interreligious dialogueReligion10.1080/0048721X.2020.175459850:3(437-454)Online publication date: 27-Apr-2020
  • (2020)The Falklands/Malvinas war taken to the Wikipedia realm: a multimodal discourse analysis of cross-lingual violations of the Neutral Point of ViewPalgrave Communications10.1057/s41599-020-0435-26:1Online publication date: 7-Apr-2020
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Published In

cover image ACM Conferences
WikiSym '06: Proceedings of the 2006 international symposium on Wikis
August 2006
152 pages
ISBN:1595934138
DOI:10.1145/1149453
  • General Chair:
  • Dirk Riehle,
  • Program Chair:
  • James Noble
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Publication History

Published: 21 August 2006

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Author Tags

  1. Foucault
  2. Wiki
  3. Wikipedia
  4. computer-mediated communication
  5. discourse theory
  6. online collaboration

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HT06
Sponsor:
HT06: 17th Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia
August 21 - 23, 2006
Odense, Denmark

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Overall Acceptance Rate 69 of 145 submissions, 48%

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Cited By

View all
  • (2023)How Did They Build the Free Encyclopedia? A Literature Review of Collaboration and Coordination among Wikipedia EditorsACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction10.1145/361736931:1(1-48)Online publication date: 29-Nov-2023
  • (2020)The space between us: considering online media for interreligious dialogueReligion10.1080/0048721X.2020.175459850:3(437-454)Online publication date: 27-Apr-2020
  • (2020)The Falklands/Malvinas war taken to the Wikipedia realm: a multimodal discourse analysis of cross-lingual violations of the Neutral Point of ViewPalgrave Communications10.1057/s41599-020-0435-26:1Online publication date: 7-Apr-2020
  • (2017)‘Anyone can edit’, not everyone does: Wikipedia’s infrastructure and the gender gapSocial Studies of Science10.1177/030631271769217247:4(511-527)Online publication date: 1-Mar-2017
  • (2015)Presence of an EcosystemProceedings of the 2015 IEEE/ACM International Conference on Advances in Social Networks Analysis and Mining 201510.1145/2808797.2809410(286-291)Online publication date: 25-Aug-2015
  • (2013)Explaining authors’ contribution to pivotal artifacts during mass collaboration in the Wikipedia’s knowledge baseInternational Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning10.1007/s11412-013-9182-39:1(97-115)Online publication date: 10-Oct-2013
  • (2013)Value Production in a Collaborative EnvironmentJournal of Statistical Physics10.1007/s10955-013-0728-6151:3-4(414-439)Online publication date: 8-Mar-2013
  • (2012)Content Analysis of Wiki Discussions for Knowledge ConstructionInternational Journal of Web-Based Learning and Teaching Technologies10.4018/jwltt.20120401037:2(28-42)Online publication date: 1-Apr-2012
  • (2012)The consensus gameProceedings of the Eighth Annual International Symposium on Wikis and Open Collaboration10.1145/2462932.2462977(1-7)Online publication date: 27-Aug-2012
  • (2011)Understanding and improving Wikipedia article discussion spacesProceedings of the 2011 ACM Symposium on Applied Computing10.1145/1982185.1982358(808-813)Online publication date: 21-Mar-2011
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