Sandra Braman (2011,1) writes that "historically, new scholarly journals appeared when new subjects of study achieved disciplinary or subdisciplinary status. Today, they are also created when new audiences and communities of scholarly practice appear." It is important to note that new scholarly publications also appear when seemingly intractable social problems reach a level of such significance they demand a central avenue of inquiry. Such is the case with the study of secrecy. In creating the peerreviewed open access journal Secrecy and Society, which exclusively focuses on secrecy and associated conditions of information, the exploration of all things secrecy now has a scholarly home. In my discussion below, I frame secrecy as a compelling social problem that often reflects Horst W.J. Rittel and Melvin M. Webber's (1973) idea of a wicked problem. In addition to this framework, I suggest the field of Secrecy Studies offers another way of investigating secrecy across the social landscape. I conclude my discussion by introducing contributions to this inaugural issue of Secrecy and Society by several of its editorial board members.
Secrecy as the intentional or unintentional concealment of information is the subject of investigation within the humanities, social sciences, journalism, law and legal studies. However, the subject it is not widely taught as a distinct social problem within higher education. In this article, I report personal experience with developing and teaching a graduate level course on a particular type of secrecy, government secrecy, at the School of Information, San Jose State University. This article includes discussion on selecting course materials, creating assignments, and navigating controversial histories. This article also sets the stage to this special issue of Secrecy and Society on the subject of teaching secrecy.
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