Communication Genres and the Mediatic Turn
I’ve been helping Theo Hug (right) to put together a panel for the International Communication Association conference coming up in a couple of months in Dresden. The panel proposal is titled “Mediatic turn - Claims, Concepts and Cases.” I’ve also been working on a paper for the panel. The paper that argues for the importance of 
Here’s the abstract:
The mediatic turn in computer systems design and analysis that is currently in its nascence is arguably long overdue. Broadly cognitivist and cybernetic frameworks associated with human factors and usability research have already been undermined in the 1990’s through what has been called an “ethnographic turn.” However, now that the personal computer and Internet have been commonplace for a decade or more, it is increasingly important to utilize mediatic terms –such as culture, genre, audience, or convention– to come to a more complete understanding of their limitations and potential. By exploring a case in which the mediatic understanding of one technology –asynchronous textual communication– has informed the use and development of systems and of related standards, this paper will provide evidence of the efficacy of such understandings in design and implementation. It will also reflect on the broader implications of the mediatic turn, such as its implied subsumption of pure technical rationality to historical, cultural and other factors.
