Crossing the Boundaries of Epistemic Communities Within and Beyond Discourse Studies

The purpose of this chapter is to discuss boundaries within and beyond discourse studies with a focus on research that crosses epistemological boundaries in order to highlight the analytical potential and possible impact of Discourse Theory and analysis beyond the field of discourse studies. The chapter provides a framework for studying how boundaries are related to epistemic authority and epistemic communities and shows what it means to cross a boundary and enable “sharing a way of seeing and defining research problems” that results in the allocation of epistemic authority.
Taking peer review as its point of departure as an agent of boundary-work, the chapter discusses three specific examples of autoethnographic encounters with peer review that involve Discourse Theory and/or analysis in three different fields: Science Studies, Information Studies and Discourse Studies, respectively. These examples offer context-bound and empirically grounded conceptualizations of boundary-work embedded in the decision-making and dialogue with reviewers in the peer review process and provide an illustration of the role of boundaries, both as markers of difference and as interfaces facilitating knowledge production.