Sharing knowledge through free online courses for audiences beyond the West

Open Research objectives/practices

Introducing Open Research concepts and practices. I developed two free online courses that aim to empower aspiring academics and non-academic researchers to 1) conduct research relying on online artifacts and 2) break the barriers in academic colonialism by navigating the Western publishing system and getting their voices heard in scholarly debates.

Introduction

I developed, recorded and made freely available two online courses of 5 and 8 weeks in length. In collaboration with a regional media supporting project of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, the two courses are available in several languages. One of them focuses on the "ins and outs" of academic publishing. The second one addresses approaches to online social science methods.

Motivation

The idea was simple - giving back by valorising knowledge and empowering local academic and non-academic researchers in Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan).

There are online tools and artifacts that allow researcher to conduct their studies in the comfort of their office/apartment. This was highly relevant during the pandemic and remains a relevant issue as a significant amount of human activity has been transferred into the digital domain. The course focuses not only on the methodology and methods, but also on the ethical side of online social research. Knowing that this topic is often ignored in the context of Central Asia, it was my central goal to put this on the discussion table to get the ethics/privacy discourse discussions a push. The second course aims to empower local researchers to navigate the Western academic system. As a scholar from the Global South working in the Western institution, it is my objective to give voice to and otherwise spotlight people, places and cases that are ignored in academia. Having gone through the process of adapting to the Western system myself, and having published 10 peer-reviewed works during my PhD trajectory, I find it to be my obligation to share some tools and perspectives with those who have not walked this journey yet. The course explains a variety of nuances, from paper structure to the process of submitting, peer-reviewing, editing, publishing and disseminating. Both courses are receiving high reviews by participants, which is the highest reward for me.

Lessons learned

Lesson #1 is that your voice sounds much weirder when it is recorded. Jokes aside, this was as much of a learning process as it was a teaching one. I have learned a lot in terms of content creation. As a media scholar, this was a great experience for me to engage in the creation part. When your lessons are recorded, there is no room for small talk, which is quite a challenge as well. This experience helped me become clearer in my delivery approaches in class, I believe.

URLs, references and further information

The ins and outs of academic publishing:
https://school.cabar.asia/en/course/the-ins-and-outs-of-academic-publishing/

Online research methods:
https://school.cabar.asia/en/course/online-research-methods/