Periodic Reporting for period 1 - NWNR (New Work, New Reading)
Reporting period: 2022-09-01 to 2025-03-31
Today, literature is facing rapid changes as new e-book formats, book streaming apps and digital library services have emerged to compete with the traditional actors in the literary field. Amongst other things, the digitization of literature has changed when and where we read, which poses problems (but also opportunities) for reading literacy, libraries and publishing.
The research project New Work, New Reading (NWNR) interrogates the relationship between new reading practices and labor. By employing computational methods to analyze reading behavior, engagement, consumption patterns and genre developments, the project investigates reading in the context of our rapidly changing workday. With my exclusive partnerships with major institutions in the Scandinavian digital publishing industry, the project advances the state of the art in studies of contemporary reading and the digital literary field.
The research project New Work, New Reading (NWNR) interrogates the relationship between new reading practices and labor. By employing computational methods to analyze reading behavior, engagement, consumption patterns and genre developments, the project investigates reading in the context of our rapidly changing workday. With my exclusive partnerships with major institutions in the Scandinavian digital publishing industry, the project advances the state of the art in studies of contemporary reading and the digital literary field.
The project studies three primary sources: 1) Questionnaires; 2) Data from the digital library service Det Danske Folkebibliotek; 3) Data from the digital bookstore and streaming service Saxo. The project visualizes comprehensive datasets on e.g. what time of the day people read, how long people read for and developments in popular genres .
The study presents a case study of the Scandinavian digital book market, has unique partnerships with major institutions in the Scandinavian digital literary industry and takes place at a leading Digital Humanities center in Sweden. Because the Scandinavian book industry has been a pioneer in developing many of the trends guiding the international book industry (digitization, data, algorithms and streaming-based services), the results will advance the state of the art in international scholarship on reading, publishing and digitization.
The outcomes of the project was 6 peer-reviewed articles, several interviews and public dissemination.
The study presents a case study of the Scandinavian digital book market, has unique partnerships with major institutions in the Scandinavian digital literary industry and takes place at a leading Digital Humanities center in Sweden. Because the Scandinavian book industry has been a pioneer in developing many of the trends guiding the international book industry (digitization, data, algorithms and streaming-based services), the results will advance the state of the art in international scholarship on reading, publishing and digitization.
The outcomes of the project was 6 peer-reviewed articles, several interviews and public dissemination.
Studies of reading often employ empirical methods such as interviews or surveys to investigate how people engage with literature. But few studies use largescale quantitative data preferring more traditional ethnographic methods designed to investigate relatively small communities of readers. My project responds to this gap in empirical studies of reading by having established partnerships with literary streaming platforms and digital libraries, which give me a unique opportunity to investigate reading “at a distance”.
Digital humanities (DH) still lack studies of contemporary reading habits. My project responds to this gap in DH scholarship by establishing partnerships with literary streaming platforms and digital libraries (see 3.3). With my unique partnerships with the digital bookstore and streaming service Saxo, a large public digital library provider (Det Danske Folkebibliotek) and a cutting-edge DH research lab (KBLab), I have the opportunity to work with streaming data that has previously been off-limits to digital literary studies.
The results of the project was published in 6 peer-reviewed articles.
Digital humanities (DH) still lack studies of contemporary reading habits. My project responds to this gap in DH scholarship by establishing partnerships with literary streaming platforms and digital libraries (see 3.3). With my unique partnerships with the digital bookstore and streaming service Saxo, a large public digital library provider (Det Danske Folkebibliotek) and a cutting-edge DH research lab (KBLab), I have the opportunity to work with streaming data that has previously been off-limits to digital literary studies.
The results of the project was published in 6 peer-reviewed articles.