“Linkedin Is My Office;Facebook My Living Room,Twitter the Neighborhood Bar”

Abstract

This study grounds 45 interviews with media scholars in liminality theory and analyzes how scholars use social media as they transition to combined offline and online communication. Scholars employ highly personal strategies to decide if and how to integrate social media into their professional lives for peer and public communication. Scholars struggle with a double bind of needing to be social media savvy while worrying about career consequences of posting publicly. Few best practices exist.

Keywords

social media faculty academia scholars liminality social networking university public sphere academic freedom free speech Twitter Facebook

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