The temporalities of free knowledge work: Making time for media engagement

Abstract

This article situates media engagement as an under-examined form of knowledge work, offering a nuanced discussion of the temporalities of media work from the perspective of expert sources and contributors. Using in-depth interviews with expert women in Canada, we focus on the temporality of media engagement to understand the complexities of this labour—that it is often unpaid, ad hoc, and contingent. We offer three key findings: First, there is an ongoingness to media participation; preparation, training, and responding to comments are less visible forms of work beyond the obvious media contact. Unpacking the ongoingness of media engagement highlights the temporalities hidden within the extended present of media work. Second, contributors need to make time for this impromptu knowledge work, a complex process involving decisions about the value of each engagement. We argue that contributing to the media demands not only the knowledge work of being a source but also the labour to make and manage the time to contribute. Third, paying attention to the spacetimes of media engagement reveals the inequalities of this work. Contributing to the media often requires working beyond typical (paid) work hours and spaces, bringing additional burdens on women who do more caring and household labour. Examining the temporalities of media engagement as a form of invisible ‘free’ labour—and as a form of knowledge work that occurs inside other knowledge work—allows us to consider how work is changing in the new economy.