engleski

Methodological approaches to modern publishing: current constrains and future prospects

The aims of this paper are to examine why the growing field of publishing studies still miss reliable methodological and theoretical background, and to indicate possible points for further considerations on such background. It was already noticed that book history, as the discipline that has researched books, publishing, reading practices etc. heavily determined methodological approaches in publishing studies. However, “replanting” approaches from one discipline to another was mostly limited to discussions about possibilities of single models, such as Robert Darnton’s model of communication circuit or Elizabet Eisenstain’s approach to the culture of print as communication instrument. Not even critiques of such models within their parent disciplines or alternative models were considered while transmitting them to the new field and the concept of a book history as intrinsically interdisciplinary field consisting of history, literature and bibliography was eluded. Sociology has been another discipline that offered models and approaches to publishing studies. For example, John B. Thompson’s insight into Pierre Bourdieu’s fields of cultural production resulted with construction of publishing fields, while Laura J. Miller adopted researches into the culture of commerce and consumption to analyse and explain the modern bookselling. All such approaches, either rooted in book history or sociology appear as acceptable hints for research questions, but not a single one of them could embrace all the challenges of the new field ; as transplants they are not sufficiently flexible and extensive for research into dynamics and contexts of modern publishing which is distinctively characterized by interleaving of p- and e- environments. Thus, the suitable methodology and theory for publishing studies should not be imported, but build up inside the discipline, paying full attention both to present changes and century’s long routines, accepting necessity for multidisciplinary approach, and embracing three pillars omnipresent in any publishing endeavour: contents, technologies and practices.

Publishing; publishing studies; publishing studies methodology

nije evidentirano