[Commlist] Post-doctoral position opening in communication sciences (24 months)

*Post-doctoral position opening in communication sciences**(24 months)*

Institute of Language and Communication (ILC) - UCLouvain

The Institute for Language and Communication - UCLouvain (Belgium) has 
an opening for a post-doctoral researcher (24 months).

This post-doctoral project will be part of a multidisciplinary project 
that aims to investigate socio-cognitive conflicts in online educational 
platforms (MOOCS) (see description here: 
_https://uclouvain.be/en/research-institutes/ilc/cecl/moocresearch2-0.html_). 
In particular, the post-doctoral research will focus *on the 
communicative constitution of controversial debates*.

Current research on the rhetoric of controversies focuses on so-called 
“micro moves” of participants. Micro moves refer to the types of 
utterances that are typical of controversial debates (e.g., proof, 
refutation, politeness).Researchers typically divide a debate into 
separate communication events which are then analyzed in isolation to 
identify patterns of micro acts recursively. These studies result in a 
very rich typology of action patterns that typify controversial 
debates.Yet, in so doing, researchers often lose sight of the way these 
ephemeral and local communicative events are scaled up to shape longer 
lasting and stabilized forms of controversial debate over time and 
space. In other words, we need to investigate the links between micro 
moves and their cumulative effects on the controversial dynamic 
understood as “specific, localized intersections of discursive sites and 
momentary opportunities” (Phillips, 1999 p.493).

Researchers studying online debates tend to inventory and categorize the 
arguments of each stakeholder group in order to highlight their 
cumulative effects. This type of methodology aggregates events to 
highlight polarization in a debate or to classify stances. However, this 
perspective neglects the relational, sequential and longitudinal 
constitution of those stances and polarization.

In this project, we posit that by combining both micro and macro 
perspectives, we will be able to map controversial debate as an 
unfolding process. Hence our project aims to answer the following questions:

1.How do controversial debates unfold? ("zooming out")(RQ1)

2.Within controversial debates, how do micro moves perform the following 
functions: triggering, stabilizing, transforming and closing? (“zooming 
in”) (RQ2)

*Key **outcomes and responsibilities*

·Develop and test methodological solutions in order to map controversial 
debates (network studies)

·Identify and analyze the role of communicative events in the unfolding 
of controversial debates

·Support and foster team-work

·Help in the coordination of the whole project

·Participate to international conferences

·Publish in international peer-review journals

*Selection criteria*

·PhD in communication sciences^1 (preferably defended before October 2019)

·Excellent knowledge of communicative constitution of organization 
research (CCO)

·Strong experience in conversational and/or network analysis of 
constitutive communication events

·Broad scientific interest beyond own field (e.g.,linguistics, 
psychology, management, and education)

·Strong intrinsic motivation, perseverance in the face of adversity

·Ability to work both in autonomy and in team

·Candidates should be fluent in English and/or French

·As data are both in French and English, a very good level in a second 
language is a strongadditional asset.

*Terms and conditions*

The appointment will initially be for 12 months and if evaluated 
positively extended with 1 additional year. The net monthly salary is 
+/- 2500 EUR. The starting date is the 1st of October 2019.

Eligibility:the candidate must have spent (lived, studied, worked) 
maximum 24 months in Belgium during the last 36 months.

*Information *

Enquiries and applications should be sent to Prof. François Lambotte

(Emailfrancois.lambotte /at/ uclouvain.be) <mailto:(francois.lambotte /at/ uclouvain.be)>

Application files must be sent no later than June 10, 2019 and should 
include a motivation letter, the CV of the candidate, and a copy of any 
paper (published or in preparation) mentioned in the CV.

Candidates selected based on their application will be invited for an 
interviewin Louvain-la-Neuve(Belgium) or via Skype on *June 24 or 26, 
2019 *(applicants are invited to save the dates).


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