My research focuses on the professional group of press agents in the publishing sector. As public relations professionals within the publishing production chain, press agents contribute to promote and increase visibility of literary works in the media, and to build their symbolic and literary value. At the crossroads of the publishing world and the media sector, press agents are cultural intermediaries, operating between the symbolic and economic aspects of literary production.
This predominantly female-dominated professional group within the cultural industry of publishing offers a unique framework for studying an “invisible” activity, and for examining how digital technology is transforming the challenges, conditions and media used by publishing houses for their public relations and communication.
This research lies at the intersection of the sociology of work and employment, the analysis of professional groups, gender and digital studies. It falls within the laboratory’s research areas of ‘Communication and organizations: discourse, actors and practices’ and ‘Cultural, educational and creative industries: sectoral reconfiguration and emerging trends’.
Particular attention is paid to the mutations within this professional group in the context of recent developments in the publishing world, technical systems and new modes of communication, in order to shed light on the transformations in publishing professions and the contemporary publishing sector, from the end of the 20th century to the present day.