Exploring the Threats to Sociable Scholarship: An Autoethnographic Viewing of Participatory News Making

Abstract

Sociable scholarship is the activity of engaging in, and disseminating academic thinking through social media as part of a commitment to be held accountable by the communities a scholar serves. Doing so has both benefits, such as increasing the people impacted by an article, and drawbacks, like ad hominem attacks. In this piece, we use collaborative autoethnography to explore common threats to sociable scholarship. We are activist scholars who are recognised internationally as experts in our field and as committed activists for social change. Marewa is a community psychologist and long-time advocate for reducing the harm caused by smoking tobacco; Cat is a Fat Studies scholar and fat activist who works to ensure fat people have the same rights as non-fat people. We reflect on our own experiences with a specific venue, Facebook Live, to share tips and tools for managing negative encounters, and suggest that universities have a responsibility to protect staff who engage as public intellectuals in digital spaces.