从知识获取沟到知识生产沟——美国博客空间中的知识霸权

From Knowledge Possession Gap to Knowledge Production Gap:Intellectual Hegemony in American Blogosphere

博客作为一种新的知识生产形式在网络空间的盛行,使个体之间知识生产的差距成为知识沟研究的一个新议题。本研究通过对一组美国全国性调查数据的分析,揭示了人们在网上以不同博客类型为表现形式的知识生产差异及其社会影响力差异。与经典的知识沟假说相一致,拥有较高社会经济地位的博客在网上生产较多政治知识,也具有较大的社会影响力。个体之间在线下的权力分布直接映射于线上,进入博客空间仅仅是参与政治公共领域的第一步。进入之后做什么,有何影响,则是更加重要的议题。将经典的知识沟假设从知识获取沟延伸到知识生产沟,本研究凸显了美国网络政治空间中存在的知识霸权。

The knowledge production gap warrants more scholarly attention when blogs become a popular form of knowledge producers. Using U.S. national survey data, this study reveals a knowledge production gap in the form of different blogs, and the associated power gap. Consistent with the original knowledge gap hypothesis, bloggers with higher socioeconomic status tend to produce more political knowledge and have more social power than lower status segments. Current power distribution online simply mirrors that offline, which makes the access to the blogosphere just a first step in participating in the political public sphere. What content to produce and how much influence one may have would be more important questions. Extending the knowledge gap hypothesis from knowledge possession gap to knowledge production gap, this study suggests a persisting intellectual and patriarchal hegemony in American online political space.