INVITATION TO CONTRIBUTE TO A SPECIAL ISSUE on MICROANALYSIS OF ONLINE DATA

to be submitted to

JOURNAL OF PRAGMATICS

Guest editors: Wyke Stommel, Radboud University; David Giles, University of Winchester; and Trena Paulus, University of Georgia

Goals of the special issue: Although computer-mediated communication (CMC) has been studied extensively for the last three decades, few researchers have explicitly addressed the methodological issues in this field, particularly at the level of microanalysis; that is, the intensive study of language use typically found in traditions such as conversation analysis. Partly this is due to the plethora of online data types, from discussion forums to social media to multimodal platforms. The uncritical application of traditional analytic methods to online data is not without its problems (Giles, Stommel, Paulus, Lester & Reed, 2015). In this special issue, we focus on the methodological opportunities and challenges inherent to the microanalysis of CMC. We welcome empirical studies as well as methodological and theoretical discussions of these issues. More specifically, we seek paper  proposals that will move forward the development of methodologies in these contexts. Topics may include:

• Empirical applications of microanalysis to the study of online interaction in a variety of data types (e.g. text-centered media like web-based chat and e-mail, multimodal environments; social media; discussion threads; comment fields)
• Methodological challenges related to microanalysis of online data
• Theoretical issues raised by digital conversation analysis and other types of microanalysis

Tentative timeline:

• Abstracts submitted: September 30, 2015
• Authors notified of acceptance: October 14, 2015
• Full manuscripts due: Feb 15, 2016
• Reviews by external reviewers: April 15, 2016
• Revised manuscripts due: June 30, 2016

Submission guidelines: Please submit a 500 word abstract, a 50 word author biographical statement, and two names of external reviewers by September 30, 2015 to mood.organizers@gmail.com. Abstracts should follow the style guidelines of the Journal of Pragmatics.

Reference: Giles, D., Stommel, W., Paulus, T., Lester, J. & Reed, D. (2015.) The micro-analysis of online data: The methodological development of “digital CA”. Discourse, Context & Media 7, 45-51.