The Hook, Woo, and Spin

Abstract

Academics using social media in the university are now a significant issue as it is being used to influence outcomes of research and teaching. Academics are conducting their scholarly lives on social media in ways that make relations with others, and their university visible. Academics create hooks for others to be interested in the work, woo them with scholarly identity work and ways of being on social media, and spin the stories of their research. In the Academics Who Tweet project the authors focused on how academics used Twitter as a research tool, developed and maintained research networks, and for professional development. This chapter draws on findings from one interview to attend to the multiple ways academics use, think about, and research with social media. This research is significant as it is focused on academics' conceptualizations of social media use and how they think it supports their professional practices.