Summary
In this paper we discuss the meaning of newness in research in the times when new paradigms of science are emerging and the sciences have become more and more fragmentary. In the positivistic and monolithic era of social science, before Kuhn and year 1966, methodologies and methods interpreting newness were simpler. In this paper it is argued the newness is more and more in the text itself, and that the dynamics of texts comes from interrelations between the subject of the text (the researcher self) and the object of it (the research audience). Scientific knowledge becomes new when it is substantiated and connected to the prior one Writing the research reports is political by nature but so is also its reading. While citation index makes researchers powerful, in gaining decisions whom to refer the colleagues make political choices that are bound to some political contexts they live and career. Building a theoretical frame is not a pure and objectivistic thing but many ways a path of choices that build the research field. Behind is a lot of social capital of the academia and at the same time the text shows and even builds it. Again, it is less and less the empirical facts itself that contributes to newness, but the ways to conceptualize and contextualize empirically based knowledge. In the times when subjectivity is grown into science and pure empirical data does not work in the same way it used to be, becoming a researcher with the right to access science text publishing is not only professional but more and more narrative by nature. The credibility and trust is of a lot of worth at the society of today, not least in academia. Personality, biography and social context of a researcher are perhaps becoming more important than it used to be and that makes the issue that the impact of the researcher on has grown. Gatekeepers of science and administrational processes that they guide form criteria according to which researchers are selected and promoted further. That way individual background issues like gender and ethnicity may either grow or diminish the credibility of the individual researcher and have a lot of impact on the fact on who passes the gate of becoming a knowledge holder in the future. In the paper we also argue that subjectivity is more and more compensated by inter-subjectivity in writing because of joint texts. In gate-keeping about who enters the knowledge holder-limit this states as well.
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Extract
How to Become a Knowledge Holder: Creating a Piece of Scientific Knowledge with Originality
INTRODUCTION
"A text of juissance imposes a state of loss. It is a text that discomforts, unsettles the reader's historical, cultural, psychological assumptions" (Barthes, 1975)Originality and insight label any scientific contribution. But what makes the contribution novel? Often study results are raised in light, which means, what is found based on empirical data and compared to earlier studies. Social sciences however not so often build their results strictly on earlier study results, at least not in the same way as do technical and medical sciences. There are not so concrete products coming out using the study results. In addition, studies based on inquiries and on quantitative data analysis methods meet the requirements about "what is novel" other ways than do studies based on qualitative data and interpretations. Publications based on qualitative research are probably more flexible in their structure and writing. Quantitative research uses more numbers to document the novelty. In addition, results of studies are multiple. The way to raise the problems, the discussion between the problem and earlier research and the way to refer it are as important as are the results themselves. Also the text itself stimulates the reader, as we can see in citations from the articles. The creative process behind the text is of meaning as well. Citation index for instance is based on citations made out of the text by other researchers and these can concern whatever part of the article texture. The more citations, the more impact the text and the researcher(s) behind have. The more academic power they have. The text is found interesting, it has maybe "unsettled the reader's historical, cultural, psychological assumptions" (Barthes, 1975). The interaction process is not only technical and data based, but also emotional. Earlier texts must raise desires as well as be formally right to become cited.Citations and interaction in a way show and make the novelty of the research and text. To create a new scientific piece of knowledge does not happen in a knowledge vacuum, but is substantiated and connected to other knowledge in the field.As an overview of using scientific method, the researcher makes many steps before her product becomes novel. A research process is chronological, phased but at the same time iterative chain that cumulates learning and knowledge. It outlines the research theme into the problems which enable the study, and which can be solved by the means of research. The written research product, such as a research report, constitutes an entity, the parts of which are related to each other.A professional researcher shows a proper scientific data gathering process and the use of scientific methods, as well as the knowing of the paradigms of science. The ontological and epistemologica! training is required for instance from doctoral candidates who are novices of "knowledge holders". A researcher is a part of ...See the full content of this document
