Abstract
In this chapter, Barbour et al. explore the relationship between historical models of scientific personas and the ways in which present-day scientists represent themselves through their online biographies. The core argument is that identifiable features of the personas produced by historical scientists continue to be reproduced, at least in part, by scientists working in the present day. These personas, which were based on the sociocultural expectations of their times, particularly in the period in which ‘science’ became formalized and recognized, have become part of the discourse about what it means to be a scientist on an international scale. Hence, some key themes are shared between historical scientific personas and contemporary personas constructed through online biographies by scientists who seek to communicate to, and engage, with the broader public.
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Acknowledgements
We gratefully acknowledge receipt of funding for this study from the 2017−2018 Interdisciplinary Research Funding scheme at the University of Adelaide via the Public Engagement in Science and Technology Adelaide (PESTA) research cluster. We also extend our thanks to our research assistants: Aislinn Rossi for her work on the pilot project, and Caitlin Adams for the second round of data collection and coding.
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Barbour, K., Ankeny, R.A., Plewa, C., Conduit, J. (2021). Scientific Persona Performance Through Online Biographies and Their Relationship to Historical Models. In: Niskanen, K., Barany, M.J. (eds) Gender, Embodiment, and the History of the Scholarly Persona. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49606-7_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49606-7_8
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