The slow merging of my two worlds (academia and blogging)
I’ve talked about this with all my academic friends who blog. Kate Milberry, for example, has blogs about her research. Beth Snow, has a personal blog. And recently, in a brunch conversation with Dale and MJ, I came to realize that I have followed a strange pathway in the merging of my academic and blogging world.
At the beginning, I would blog only about my personal stuff, local events, etc. More recently, I’ve begun to write about my research and I even created a “My Research Posts” page. Furthermore, I’ve been sharing a recent book chapter I wrote on environmental non-governmental organizations with a few of my blogosphere friends, and it’s felt really good, particularly because now my social media/tech/PR friends can know more about what I do for my “day job”.
Interestingly enough, being an academic who blogs has brought me some freelance and consulting work. While I am not entirely shocked (and I’m rather, very pleased) it’s still something I did not expect at the beginning. So, as I told MJ and Dale, I am now creating a separate research blog that will contain entries that are much more specific to my research. Definitely still trying to keep the technical language (jargon) to a bare minimum.
I’d be curious to know what people think of keeping a separate research/teaching/consulting blog (focused on my environmental work) and this personal blog. Should they cross-link?
Related posts:
- Pulling back and the concept of Slow Blogging
- On the personal nature of blogs
- Developing thicker skin in academia and in blogging
- Reputation, academia and blogging
- Different models of feedback: Academia and the blogosphere
FWIW, I think that you should only have one blog. Both parts of your life are driven from your perspective on particular issues. And, your ability to communicate and be sociable is what will allow you to share your research and academic knowledge with a broader audience. Sure, you might have to occasionally leave something off as too “personal,” but use that as twitter fodder.