July 2009

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• Biography, Communication and Media Studies, Cultural Studies, Humanities, Life Writing, Literary Studies

  Digital Biography

  25.07.09 | Permalink | Comments Off on Digital Biography

  This paper reflects on an emerging field that has no accepted name or boundaries but is described here as “digital biography.” The activities, formats, and genres associated with this field are rarely linked with life writing or traditional biographical studies. Rather, this field is seen as the domain of those concerned with digital privacy, copyright, data preservation, and identity management. Over the past decade or so, critics in various disciplines, mainly legal studies, information management, multimedia design, and IT development, as well as sociology, psychology, and marketing, have focused on the complexity of online identity. Though online identity has become such a significant focus of attention in these disciplines, few who study biography have discussed it. Indeed, as Nigel Hamilton points out, biography itself has had less attention than one might expect for a field that “has enjoyed an extraordinary renaissance in recent years”, a field that, according to Carl Rollyson, is widely recognized as “the dominant non-fiction of our age”.

about

Paul Arthur is Vice-Chancellor’s Professorial Research Fellow and Chair in Digital Humanities and Social Sciences, at Edith Cowan University, Western Australia. He speaks and publishes widely on major challenges and changes facing 21st-century society, from the global impacts of technology on communication, culture and identity to migration and human rights. His forthcoming book is Open Scholarship in the Humanities (2023, with Lydia Hearn). From 2016–21 he was director of the Edith Cowan Centre for Global Issues, and in 2021–2022 leader of ECU’s university-wide Society and Culture research theme. A Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, he has held visiting positions in Europe, Asia-Pacific and North America, and has given over one hundred keynote, plenary and invited talks in more than twenty countries. Click here for full Profile

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