Multiple Texts as a Limiting Factor in Online Learning: Quantifying (Dis-)similarities of Knowledge Networks across Languages

We test the hypothesis that the extent to which one obtains information on a given topic through Wikipedia depends on the language in which it is consulted. Controlling the size factor, we investigate this hypothesis for a number of 25 subject areas. Since Wikipedia is a central part of the web-based information landscape, this indicates a language-related, linguistic bias. The article therefore deals with the question of whether Wikipedia exhibits this kind of linguistic relativity or not. From the perspective of educational science, the article develops a computational model of the information landscape from which multiple texts are drawn as typical input of web-based reading. For this purpose, it develops a hybrid model of intra- and intertextual similarity of different parts of the information landscape and tests this model on the example of 35 languages and corresponding Wikipedias. In this way the article builds a bridge between reading research, educational science, Wikipedia research and computational linguistics.Comment: 40 pages, 13 figures, 5 table

Preface: World Literature in an Expanding Digital Space

Wikipedia, the world’s largest encyclopedia, and Wikidata, the rapidly growing knowledge graph, are not yet widely used in literary studies, but their scale and multilingualism make them particularly suitable as new means for the study of world literature. This is the hypothesis at the heart of this special issue. Our preface provides a research overview of the topic, briefly summarizes the articles that constitute this issue, and focuses on overarching aspects and common challenges

ARL White Paper on Wikidata: Opportunities and Recommendations

In this Association of Research Libraries white paper, a task force of expert Wikidata users recommend a variety of ways for librarians to use the open knowledge base in advancing global discovery of their collections, faculty, and institutions. Beyond the task force, many library professionals from within and outside the Wikimedia community contributed to the white paper in draft form, offering a productive mix of enthusiasm and skepticism that improved the final product. ARL convened the task force and wrote this white paper to inform its membership about GLAM (galleries, libraries, archives, and museums) activity in Wikidata and to highlight opportunities for research library involvement, particularly in community-based collections, community-owned infrastructure, and collective collections

Performing academics : return to meritocracy?

There is a growing number of critics who claim that modern changes of the university, based on the market fundamentalism and performance management paradigm, undermine the academic culture, ethos and trust and weaken the cultural mission of the university. The chapter focuses on a critique of the ongoing erosion of an important cultural function performed until very recently by the Western universities, which is democratization of social life through development of critical thinking, imagination, and through cultivation of social and humanistic sensibility. The main aim of this chapter is to analyze the current state of the corporate university and to reflect on the bureaucracy as a potential solution for the neoliberal limitations

ARL White Paper on Wikidata: Opportunities and Recommendations

This white paper highlights opportunities for research library involvement in Wikidata, particularly in community-based collections, community-owned infrastructure, and collective collections

Changing Higher Education Learning with Web 2.0 and Open Education Citation, Annotation, and Thematic Coding Appendices

Appendices of citations, annotations and themes for research conducted on four websites: Delicious, Wikipedia, YouTube, and Facebook