Forum: The Metaphors We Use

This forum explores our metaphorization of periodicals. Six brief treatments of metaphors used by contemporary periodical scholars illuminate the affordances and limits of our use of one concept to describe another. The notoriously slippery idea of the periodical is here understood variously through the metaphors of network, printscape, curation, texture, fragmentation, recovery, and medium. Each essay seeks to be clear eyed about the usefulness of the metaphor it discusses as well as its problems and blind spots. Together, the essays offer a consideration of contemporary periodical scholarship by reflecting on the words we use to do it.