Inclusion out of passion? Contemporary Amateurism and the Concept of Expertise
The project studies amateurism as a novel production mode for expertise. Contemporary amateurism is understood as the passionate, unpaid participation of non-professionals in specialized fields. For incumbent producers of expertise (i.e. professions, organizations, and intelligent artefacts), Amateurism increasingly poses both new challenges as well as new potentials. On the basis of three case studies (amateur speculators, amateur pastors, and amateur book reviewers), the project describes the specific features of the amateurial mode for expertise, and asks about theoretical implications of amateurism on the societal level.
Duration:
16 February 2015 - 12 February 2018
Research Team:
Désirée Waibel, M.A. (Head of project)
The project studies amateurism as a novel production mode for expertise. Contemporary amateurism is understood as the passionate, unpaid participation of non-professionals in specialized fields. For incumbent producers of expertise (i.e. professions, organizations, and intelligent artefacts), Amateurism increasingly poses both new challenges as well as new potentials. On the basis of three case studies (amateur speculators, amateur pastors, and amateur book reviewers), the project describes the specific features of the amateurial mode for expertise, and asks about theoretical implications of amateurism on the societal level.
Duration:
16 February 2015 - 12 February 2018
Research Team:
Désirée Waibel, M.A. (Head of project)
My dissertation project aims to put forth a new theoretical account of contemporary amateurism, which is developed out of innovative empirical research. The distinguishing characteristic of the form of amateurism investigated by my research – in contrast to its historical precedents as well as to its further concurrent forms – is that those amateurs assemble into large, transnational collectives. Enabled by large organizations and firms as well as by major online infrastructures, amateurial production, reproduction and service of expertise has grown steadily and recently became highly visible in many expertise arenas. In this process, traditional jurisdictions over expert performances are challenged and altered. By conceptualizing amateurisms as a mode by virtue of which modern society embodies expertise, my research seeks to approach the characteristics and impact of these phenomena on a general level. Conceptually, I argue that contemporary amateurism can only be understood with recourse to other modes of embodying expertise, which are predominantly the professions, organizations, and commodities (i.e. physical expert artefacts). Drawing on operative sociological approaches concerned with expertise institutionalization, I therefore develop the concept of expertise regimes. This analytical framework guides my investigation into (a) what amateurs actually do, into (b) how their activities are linked to the task area of their professional counterparts, as well as into (c) their resources of instruction and into their practices and structure of expertise valuation and (d) the structure of their expert service's clientele. My concept is intimately linked to three case studies out of fairly different arenas of expertise: the amateur speculators on social trading platforms (financial markets), the amateur reviewer of popular literature on Amazon (art) and the amateur pastor in churches and communities of different denominations (religion). As my research includes both multiple theoretical concepts as well as highly hetergeneous data, I employ the research strategies of grounded theory. A specific inquiry is conducted for each case, which is complemented with visits to local workplaces, interviews, and public discourse analysis.
More information:
Project Summary in German on The NSRF-Database
Duration:16 February 2015 - 12 February 2018
Research Team:Désirée Waibel, M.A. (Head of project)
Project Type:Qualification project
