Book-Length Scholarly Essays as a Hybrid Genre in Science

Abstract

Drawing on existing work on popularizations, this investigation of book-length scholarly essays by practicing scientists across three disciplines reveals a hybrid genre that is neither popularization nor research report. The study utilizes both textual analysis and personal commentary from the writer-researchers to achieve a three-way comparison between the popularization, research article, and the book-length scholarly essay that clarifies how these essays contribute to the authors’ academic agendas. Writing for both a general audience and a jury of their peers, these academics employ an argumentative generic structure. Such argumentation develops a rhetoric of rational inquiry, where understanding how answers to perplexing problems are arrived at is just as important as the answers themselves. This genre also suggests the possible resurfacing of the essayist tradition in the sciences, as these practicing researchers engage with wider audiences in theoretical and philosophical speculation.

What is meant by hybridity? An investigation of hybridity and related terms in genre studies

“…Varghese and Abraham (2004), for example, analyze what they refer to as "book-length scholarly essays," such as Steven Pinker's The Language Instinct and Howard Gardner's Frames of Mind, in which academics make their research and their theories more accessible to the general public. The essays are directed not only at a lay audience, including academics who are not experts in the field in question, but also at students and colleagues within the same field.…”

“…This process has been called genre mixing, blurring, bending, and hybridization (Bhatia 1997;Bhatia 2004;Fairclough, 2003;Herring et al 2004;Varghese and Abraham 2004;Kong 2006;Solin 2006;Catenaccio 2008). We shall use the term genre blending since we use hybridization and mixing as cover terms for all of the phenomena that are discussed in this article.…”

“…Genre blending can result in generic change and new genres, which in turn can gradually become established and conventionalized; thus, it is tied to issues related to the (relative) stability of genres (Fairclough 1989;Fairclough 1992;Fairclough 2003;Bhatia 2004;Varghese and Abraham 2004;Kong 2006;Solin 2006;Solin 2009;Catenaccio 2008). Varghese and Abraham (2004), for example, analyze what they refer to as "book-length scholarly essays," such as Steven Pinker's The Language Instinct and Howard Gardner's Frames of Mind, in which academics make their research and their theories more accessible to the general public.…”

“…The term hybrid (or mixed) genre is typically used for the products of genre blending (see Section 3.5) which constitute new and emerging genres: Varghese and Abraham's (2004) book-length scholarly essay and Bhatia's (2004) advertorial. Catenaccio (2008, however, also regards a press release as a hybrid genre combining reporting and self-promotion (advertisement), even though advertising and promotion have long been common properties of press releases.…”

“…texts that surround us (e.g., Bhatia 2000;Bhatia 2004;Sarangi 2000;Sarangi 2011;Fairclough 2003;Östman and Simon-Vandenbergen 2004;Swales 2004;Varghese and Abraham 2004;Kong 2006;Martin and Rose 2008;Solin 2008;Solin 2009;Lähdesmäki 2009;Catenaccio 2008). While the terms and concepts used by different researchers working in different research traditions are incommensurable -they are tied to theoretical assumptions that underlie the research, the nature of the spoken or written data, and the purposes for which the research has been carried out -they nevertheless overlap.…”