Although our definition of “new media” may still be unclear, we should now have a better understanding of what a blog entails. There is no question that there is a wide variety of blogs on the Internet—ranging from Perez Hilton to the Huffington Post. People may read specific blogs for different reasons. If I’m looking for fashion ideas, I’m more likely to go to LookBook or other fashion websites. If I’m looking for updates on world politics, I’m more likely to read a news blog. However, I am realizing the importance of knowing whether or not a blog is a reliable source of information. Andrew Sullivan speaks very highly of blogs stating,
“It is the spontaneous expression of instant thought—impermanent beyond even the ephemera of daily journalism.”If a blog is instantaneous, we’ve learned that there is ample room for mistakes. Sheehan defines new media as an electronic revolution, especially since the invention of the computer. This “revolution” allows for extreme broadcasting capabilities, which sends messages instantaneously to large groups of people. The question posed for this assignment is to evaluate the academic blogs given to us using the Sheehan and Sullivan readings as sources.
The first blog given to us was Art(h)ist’ry. The main blogger is “gninja.” The blog looks like it used to be updated frequently, but hasn’t been updated since January 29, 2008, nearly three yeas ago. The posts are visually stimulating, using a variety of colorful images to draw attention. As Sullivan describes in his article, blogs are
“…linked via hypertext to continuously multiple references and sources.”This blog relies heavily on links (general art links, medieval art links, and news links. She states:
"I often start my day with an easy glide into news and check out Gothamist. Part news-you-can-use, part odd sundries relating to NY life, it’s a nice way to keep abreast of local matters. For more a newsy source, I still go to the Village Voice. I overlook its bitchy tone when I have to. More snobbishly, the Observer has its own charms. NYPress is hit or miss."She links these websites via hypertext, allowing the user to see a variety of websites with just a click of the mouse.
The second blog is titled Out of the Crooked Timber. I noticed immediately that there were a variety of authors, multiple comments, and posts frequently. I was a bit confused with what this blog actually was and, fortunately, found an article about it on Wikipedia:
Crooked Timber is a widely-read political blog run by a group of (mostly) academics from and working in several different nations, including the United States, the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, Australia and Singapore.It is ranked in the top 100 academic blogs and the members of the blog are all highly respected academic people, many of whom are political philosophers or sociologists at well-known and respected universities. The website links to the contributors' Wikipedia entries, which shows just how reliable their information is. The Front Porch Republic blog was similar in terms of contributors. Both websites have multiple contributors, but they are all very respected in their field. FPR posts are not as frequent, but a bit lengthier in content. As Sheehan says,
“…one example is the fading of geographical distinctions among people.”We can see that these two blogs bring contributors from around the world together because of similar interests. Crooked Timber’s contributors range from Switzerland to Chicago and they are capable of posting blogs and commenting on each other’s blogs despite the great geographical boundaries. The Public Reason blog for political philosophers was also similar to Crooked Timber and FPR in terms of having members and contributors from around the country, uniting together for a common purpose.
I’m actually currently enrolled in Political Science 101 (I know this might be strange because I’m a senior, but I’ve always wanted to take the class). The fourth blog that I evaluated was the course website: Intro to Political Theory Blog. It is a requirement to post blogs in order to pass the class. Therefore, the blog posts are not necessarily reliable, as they’re written by students, many of whom are just posting to post. The topics range from Karl Marx to Charlie Chaplin and students incorporate what we discuss in class into their blog post. I’d be curious what my fellow classmates think about a student’s posts on an academic website. Does it make the website more or less reliable? Are people more interested in reading an expert’s post or a peer’s post?
David Bordwell’s website on cinema blog was my favorite (if we’re allowed to pick favorites here). The blog itself has been around for several years, launching in 2006. It’s organized by a variety of categories: silent films, 3D films, film criticism, and by directors, animation, or actors. The website does an excellent job using images and statistics (charts). For example, a recent post about the top grossing movies of 2010 used a chart to show the income. Not only was the chart visually stimulating, but it actually made things clearer to me! Some of the posts were very informative and others were just fun to read. Throughout the website, there is hypertext linking the reader to other websites that are relevant. Hypertexts are such a huge part of new media:
“But the superficiality masked considerable depth—greater depth, from one perspective, than the traditional media could offer. The reason was a single technological innovation: the hyperlink.”
The Sweetland Writing Center website was very easy for me to understand. Unlike the other websites that had hundreds of hyperlinks and past archives, the SWC website was less crowded with posts. The posts were relevant to both Sweetland’s history and the people that work there. I really enjoyed the image about the University of Michigan’s Sweetland Writing Center that explained (in graphic-form) what Sweetland does (photo below):
Aswin Punathambekar is a well known Communications professor that I’ve, unfortunately, never had as a Communications major. His website, Bollyspace 2.0, was used in another one of my courses. The website focuses on Bollywood as a cultural icon. He discusses films, books, games, new media, and politics involving Bollywood. The blog differs from some of the others because it’s more of an opinionated blog. Nevertheless, I can tell from the comments that the audience is very global reaching Hyderabad in India.
As an individual who reads many blogs, I felt that this assignment gave me a better understanding of what an academic blog looks like. But, I won’t lie, I felt that a lot of the blogs I evaluated and spent time looking at were, for lack of a better word, a bit dry and boring. I will leave this post with a question: What can academic blogs do to make them more appealing to youth?
Allie-
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with your analysis of academic blogs: More often than not, the tone of these blogs are formal and the content a bit dry. What academic blogs sacrifice in interest and entertainment, they make up for in credibility and justification. When students post on academic websites, the credibility of that website potentially drops a few points. Just look at the comment boxes: responses are oftentimes fragmented, unprofessional, and highly opinionated. To include a student response in an academic paper is similar to quoting a sentence from wikipedia: the validity of the information is just too uncertain.
So what do we gain from student posts? What exactly are you getting out of this specific blog? If it is not credible, why read it? I think the answer lies within the foundations of new media itself. Put simply, new media allows us to share. To spread ideas. To express ourselves. To add to this universal storage container of typed out thought-process. Though we may not have PhDs or even Bachelors degrees, our opinion counts. Student posts on academic blogs may not be credible, but the ideas proposed on these platforms have the ability to spark questions waiting to be answered, ideas that have the potential to be researched.
Allie-
ReplyDeleteI think we are on the similar terms in regards to how we both feel about academic blogs. While looking through the selection of academic blogs that we were introduced to, I scanned through a mix of the authors posts, and then I glanced at the comments which were written in regards to those posts. When doing this, I focused my attention to the first question that you posed about student posts:
"Does it make the website more or less reliable? Are people more interested in reading an expert’s post or a peer’s post?"
I thought about this question for a while and I think that it ultimately depends on the reader and what the reader wants to get out of the posts they are reading. I know from my own personal experience that there are times when I want to look at what other people have to say in order to see whether or not they have the same views that I do on the situation. However, there may also be times when I have a set view on a certain matters, where I am not going to be influenced by the thoughts of other people and there won't be anything on the site that could change my mind.
In contrast, there are times when evaluating the insight of others can be important in shaping our ideas, which is why in many cases, looking at the posts of other students or the posts of our peers may be a beneficial supplement to our own thoughts.
So I say, once you have formulated your own thoughts, there is no harm in seeing what others have to say on the matters.
Also, to answer your last question on how we can make academic blogs more appealing to youth, I think all they need is a bit more visuals and the incorporation of interactivity. I think during this day and age, interactivity is key and if academic bloggers can construct a way for the readers to interact with the blog and be attracted to its visuals, the academic blog will be all the more appealing.
Just wanted to point out to Allie that this is some extraordinary work. It is really comprehensive and the hyperlinkage and quotage is incredibly impressive and I aspire to be at this level of blogging.
ReplyDeleteNice work, you're making me look bad here!
-Jordan