Here's three ideas... I'm presenting them as per Ira's instructions on his videos (the narrative and the big picture):
1. narrative about my experience of having my husband go through four or five electro-convulsive therapy sessions -- a therapy used to treat major depression, and one that causes short-term memory loss. The big picture would be to capture on audio the incredibly disconcerting experience of having to be the person in charge -- having to help someone regain their most basic memories (like our children's names) -- and having to do it alone. In many ways it would be a story about becoming an adult.
2. narrative about a friend's experience beating up his girlfriend while in college. The big picture is to look at how a relatively peaceful person finds himself doing something reprehensible and how he deals with the memory of his actions.
3. narrative of a ghost story... My older brother, two older sisters and myself experienced something akin to a ghost story when we were young. We all have slightly different versions of it now that we are adults -- and we all love to tell the story. I envision having phone conversations with my sisters and brothers and then piecing the conversations together to tell the story - mixing their voices and versions. But I don't know of any technology that I could use to tape phone conversations... Still, I think it would be entertaining. The big picture would be to see how a version of a story changes across time and perspective.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Saturday, September 27, 2008
This American Life
Alright -- being asked to listen to episodes of TAL is maybe the best assignment I've ever been given in school. I am an avid TAL fan, and have a huge crush on Ira Glass. But that is beside the point. I'm tempted to take the first few paragraphs of this blog to chronicle my devotion to this radio program, but that's not really the blog assignment, is it? That said, I think I will write two or three sentences anyway -- just because the format of a blog allows for it.
I started listening to TAL life in 2000, but it wasn't until 2005 (or there abouts) that I found the free podcast. What I've done since then is to download the weekly podcast, supplement it with past episodes, which only cost 95 cents, and then listen to them as I run and/or bike. I've trained for several marathons with only my dog and Ira as companions -- and they're all I really need.
I'm certain I like this program for the reasons that we were assigned to listen to a couple of episodes -- because of the sounds the listener gets to hear and the stories they create. The three episodes in our class schedule are wonderful representations of the way in which this program uses sound in innovative ways.
My favorite sound, which others have picked up on and tried out in their own radio shows, is laughter -- the sincere laughter -- of the host, Ira. The short piece about the babysitters who let fall our of their bag evidence of their having eaten a grapefruit and a can of black beans gives us the best of Ira's laugh. But it's in every episode. When he finds something is funny, he laughs and he doesn't edit out this genuine response to someone else's words/story.
What else? Ira creates an intimacy with his audience by speaking into the microphone in a regular voice, with regular intonation, and real pacing. If he wants to repeat himself, he does. (There's a great example of this in the New Beginnings Episode -- I forget the phrase he repeats, but he repeats it three times before finishing his sentence.) It is as if he is looking us "in the eye," as he was advised to do in that first show. It feels to me a little like getting a tape from my grandmother when I was little. As she talked into the microphone, she had a real audience -- my family and me -- in mind, and we knew it by her voice and by her pauses.
Of course the most obvious brilliant use of sound that Ira employs is music. I loved the music he chose for the start of the 20 short acts episode -- fast paced, made to feel like hurrying. I also love the carnival tunes he often chooses to create a sense of the unordinary within the ordinary. A favorite episode, which was recently replayed but came out first two summers ago, was about breakups. Starlee Kine tells asking Phil Collins how to write a great love song about unrequitted love. She plays the best tragic love songs as a part of her piece -- from Phil Collins to Bonnie Raitt's "I can't make you love me." The music, including the song she eventually writes, makes fun in a very good natured way of all break up songs ever written. I remember listening to that story while running through a canyon up in the Sacramentos and feeling almost sheepishly embarrassed at my own love of break up songs and their sticky sweet sappiness. It was wonderful.
I listened to the "A Little Bit of Knowledge" episode this past July while weeding. I found myself laughing out loud at the many times I too have gotten into adulthood without questioning basic assumptions, as well contributing to my own version of "Modern Jackass." So in this case -- and many others, I not only hear Ira's laughter at an adult who doesn't yet realize that unicorns aren't real, but my own laughter. And of course I never listen to David Sidaris' contributions without laughing out loud. Ira seems to have access to stories and story tellers with whom I connect.
The music, the quality of voice and recording, Ira's and my laughter, the organic sounds in the stories told -- they all have part in making this one of the best radio shows ever.
I started listening to TAL life in 2000, but it wasn't until 2005 (or there abouts) that I found the free podcast. What I've done since then is to download the weekly podcast, supplement it with past episodes, which only cost 95 cents, and then listen to them as I run and/or bike. I've trained for several marathons with only my dog and Ira as companions -- and they're all I really need.
I'm certain I like this program for the reasons that we were assigned to listen to a couple of episodes -- because of the sounds the listener gets to hear and the stories they create. The three episodes in our class schedule are wonderful representations of the way in which this program uses sound in innovative ways.
My favorite sound, which others have picked up on and tried out in their own radio shows, is laughter -- the sincere laughter -- of the host, Ira. The short piece about the babysitters who let fall our of their bag evidence of their having eaten a grapefruit and a can of black beans gives us the best of Ira's laugh. But it's in every episode. When he finds something is funny, he laughs and he doesn't edit out this genuine response to someone else's words/story.
What else? Ira creates an intimacy with his audience by speaking into the microphone in a regular voice, with regular intonation, and real pacing. If he wants to repeat himself, he does. (There's a great example of this in the New Beginnings Episode -- I forget the phrase he repeats, but he repeats it three times before finishing his sentence.) It is as if he is looking us "in the eye," as he was advised to do in that first show. It feels to me a little like getting a tape from my grandmother when I was little. As she talked into the microphone, she had a real audience -- my family and me -- in mind, and we knew it by her voice and by her pauses.
Of course the most obvious brilliant use of sound that Ira employs is music. I loved the music he chose for the start of the 20 short acts episode -- fast paced, made to feel like hurrying. I also love the carnival tunes he often chooses to create a sense of the unordinary within the ordinary. A favorite episode, which was recently replayed but came out first two summers ago, was about breakups. Starlee Kine tells asking Phil Collins how to write a great love song about unrequitted love. She plays the best tragic love songs as a part of her piece -- from Phil Collins to Bonnie Raitt's "I can't make you love me." The music, including the song she eventually writes, makes fun in a very good natured way of all break up songs ever written. I remember listening to that story while running through a canyon up in the Sacramentos and feeling almost sheepishly embarrassed at my own love of break up songs and their sticky sweet sappiness. It was wonderful.
I listened to the "A Little Bit of Knowledge" episode this past July while weeding. I found myself laughing out loud at the many times I too have gotten into adulthood without questioning basic assumptions, as well contributing to my own version of "Modern Jackass." So in this case -- and many others, I not only hear Ira's laughter at an adult who doesn't yet realize that unicorns aren't real, but my own laughter. And of course I never listen to David Sidaris' contributions without laughing out loud. Ira seems to have access to stories and story tellers with whom I connect.
The music, the quality of voice and recording, Ira's and my laughter, the organic sounds in the stories told -- they all have part in making this one of the best radio shows ever.
Saturday, September 20, 2008
sounds...
Write a short reflection on what you listened to and any connections you noticed to the readings.
I listened to several of the sounds at the various sites linked to our course website. What I noticed as I listened to the sounds -- like the subway in New York or birds in a rain forest -- was that I put pictures to each of the sounds -- not words, but pictures. Both articles assigned treat sound as an integral part of our experience as humans, yet acknowledge that it is not paid much attention to.
The Selfe piece especially caught my attention. On page 21 she writes about "richly textured websites" that house everything, including video, audio, photographic essays. It seems that the audio and photographic essay has a close link. If an audio file has the ability to create a kind of photographic essay in the mind of the listener, how might a composition instructor use this connection? I've been thinking about this question for a couple of days now; my mind has lighted and stuck on some ideas that are really only tangential, but that I want to explore in this blog.
I listened to several of the sounds at the various sites linked to our course website. What I noticed as I listened to the sounds -- like the subway in New York or birds in a rain forest -- was that I put pictures to each of the sounds -- not words, but pictures. Both articles assigned treat sound as an integral part of our experience as humans, yet acknowledge that it is not paid much attention to.
The Selfe piece especially caught my attention. On page 21 she writes about "richly textured websites" that house everything, including video, audio, photographic essays. It seems that the audio and photographic essay has a close link. If an audio file has the ability to create a kind of photographic essay in the mind of the listener, how might a composition instructor use this connection? I've been thinking about this question for a couple of days now; my mind has lighted and stuck on some ideas that are really only tangential, but that I want to explore in this blog.
- What technology does the typical DACC student have access to to produce audio files? Photographic essays? What would the value be? Selfe -- I think -- makes an implicit argument that a writing teacher should use sound for sounds sake, not only as a way to teach writing. So the value might be to see the way argument is built into sound and sight, as well as text.
- If the typical computer lab that a DACC student takes a writing class in does not have access to programs like Garage Band, or even Audacity, are the partnerships that might be formed with other programs to provide this access? I'm thinking of the CMT program... Maybe Rebecca Kongs would schedule a section of ENGL 111 specifically for her CMT majors in one of her Mac labs...
- If this access were secured, which would be most powerful for students to produce? An audio essay or a photographic essay? If there were students in a writing class, it seems like I would have to connect the essay to the writing process and concepts of argumentation.
- Could I create an audio essay? Or a photographic essay? Or a video that could be posted on YouTube that would a) help me practice this form of expression; and b) help me teach students how to use the technology? Who would help me learn the technology? My sons?
- Selfe seems to argue that projects which acknowledge the sounds of the students gives students who are not academic natives a voice. Could I really achieve this lofty goal by including sound in the composition classroom?
- If sound is so important, maybe I should once again try audio assessments of essays. Would that be a more effective way of assessing student learning than typing comments into the margins of papers? Comments which are often not read? I tried this years ago with tape players, but the fact that students had to find a taperecorder to listen to my comments became impractical... But I wonder about audio files. I use Audacity to deliver audio messages to my students in the online classes I teach, and they respond well to those... Why not audio assessments? I even wonder if there is some research that might come out of something like that -- especially given that my research interests include meaningful assessment.
- Selfe talks about using the composition class as a place to practice different literacies. I like the ideas of thinking about interacting with sounds (I wrote "reading" sounds and then deleted that...) as a kind of literacy. I especially like her argument that composition teachers should be helping students find more than one tool to help them communicate effectively. It seems clear that using sound could -- maybe should -- be one of those tools...
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
In what ways do you see blogs being used for political purposes and/or civic discourse and how is this useful (or not)?
It's clear to me now that blogs are used for both political and and civic discourse. The ways in which bloggers use their blogs to promote specific ideologies is evident in the list of the political blogs on our schedule. Clicking through several of them -- and then on to other political blogs -- provided me with information, stories, ideas -- "news" -- that I didn't get from the news websites I read or from NPR. But it really is more than that -- more than just having access to different kinds of news stories and opinions. I felt connected to some larger public sphere (discussed in the Barton piece) in a way that I haven't experienced before. Barton's ideas about the necessity of maintaining a public arena for conversation is fascinating. While I didn't post comments to any of the blogs I read, and so wasn't an active participant, I was an evesdropper, of sorts. Maybe there were people like me who hung out in the British Coffee Houses (of course they would have been men) and just listened in on conversations until they figured out the conventions for participating. These evesdroppers are still part of the discourse -- maybe acting as the audience for the performers (bloggers). Regardless, I enjoyed spending time (a lot last night!) participating in this activity. It felt very different from reading the news on Yahoo...
I am also fascinated, though not surprised, at the way in which Wal-Mart is using blogs to promote and doctor its image. Is that civic discourse? I think not... It's a shameless version of spin (though what isn't). I wonder, as does Trevor Jones, author of the article "If you blog anonymously, are you really blogging?"- what the consequences are to anonymous blogging. Civic discourse, especially as Barton explains it, helps create this public sphere -- and I'm not sure what place anonimity has in it. I've not allowed anonymous postings from students in my online classes because of the way in which it changes the texts posted, and consequently the conversations that are possible. I'll have to think on/ponder what I like about the bit of inhibition created when a person must take ownership of her text. hmmm...
It's clear to me now that blogs are used for both political and and civic discourse. The ways in which bloggers use their blogs to promote specific ideologies is evident in the list of the political blogs on our schedule. Clicking through several of them -- and then on to other political blogs -- provided me with information, stories, ideas -- "news" -- that I didn't get from the news websites I read or from NPR. But it really is more than that -- more than just having access to different kinds of news stories and opinions. I felt connected to some larger public sphere (discussed in the Barton piece) in a way that I haven't experienced before. Barton's ideas about the necessity of maintaining a public arena for conversation is fascinating. While I didn't post comments to any of the blogs I read, and so wasn't an active participant, I was an evesdropper, of sorts. Maybe there were people like me who hung out in the British Coffee Houses (of course they would have been men) and just listened in on conversations until they figured out the conventions for participating. These evesdroppers are still part of the discourse -- maybe acting as the audience for the performers (bloggers). Regardless, I enjoyed spending time (a lot last night!) participating in this activity. It felt very different from reading the news on Yahoo...
I am also fascinated, though not surprised, at the way in which Wal-Mart is using blogs to promote and doctor its image. Is that civic discourse? I think not... It's a shameless version of spin (though what isn't). I wonder, as does Trevor Jones, author of the article "If you blog anonymously, are you really blogging?"- what the consequences are to anonymous blogging. Civic discourse, especially as Barton explains it, helps create this public sphere -- and I'm not sure what place anonimity has in it. I've not allowed anonymous postings from students in my online classes because of the way in which it changes the texts posted, and consequently the conversations that are possible. I'll have to think on/ponder what I like about the bit of inhibition created when a person must take ownership of her text. hmmm...
Saturday, September 13, 2008
more about blogging
Question for 9/15: Based on today's readings and the blogs you have been reading, in what ways is blogging changing and/or influencing (or not) our ways of communicating and creating/participating in community?
After reading about blogging in the past couple of weeks, I feel left out -- some how I've not known about the kind of blogging that is going on in academic communities and so am not a participant -- yet. As I read through the articles assigned for 9/15, I have a sense of urgency that I must participate. It feels, almost, like I will miss out on the important news of the academy. This is a disconcerting feeling, as I don't want to be left behind.
So as I read the piece of by Henry Farrell -- "The Blogosphere as a Carnival of Ideas"- I for the first time tried to imagine myself starting a blog to further my academic career. Would I have enough to blog about? Could I deepen my own thinking about assessment of basic writers by blogging? Would I also feel the need to blog about work and the politics at DACC, and would I end up compromised somehow? As soon as these ideas found themselves lingering in my head, I began thinking of ways of making sure that others would read my musings. This is particularly interesting in light on my conversation with Kaleb in class last Wed when I expressed an utter lack of understanding as to why people spend so much time blogging.
But then I read the interview with Ratliff -- "Clancy Ratliff: Blogger, Scholar... Blogger-Scholar"- by Meredith Graupner and Christine Deneker and put my feet back on the ground. Her suggestion, which I think I'll take up at some point, is not to start one's own blog but to join existing blogging communities. This feels like a good place to start.
How does my rant relate to the question for today? I guess that as I begin to take part in academic blogging communities and not only recognize but value their existence, I will almost certainly develop connections and ideas that I wouldn't otherwise.
After reading about blogging in the past couple of weeks, I feel left out -- some how I've not known about the kind of blogging that is going on in academic communities and so am not a participant -- yet. As I read through the articles assigned for 9/15, I have a sense of urgency that I must participate. It feels, almost, like I will miss out on the important news of the academy. This is a disconcerting feeling, as I don't want to be left behind.
So as I read the piece of by Henry Farrell -- "The Blogosphere as a Carnival of Ideas"- I for the first time tried to imagine myself starting a blog to further my academic career. Would I have enough to blog about? Could I deepen my own thinking about assessment of basic writers by blogging? Would I also feel the need to blog about work and the politics at DACC, and would I end up compromised somehow? As soon as these ideas found themselves lingering in my head, I began thinking of ways of making sure that others would read my musings. This is particularly interesting in light on my conversation with Kaleb in class last Wed when I expressed an utter lack of understanding as to why people spend so much time blogging.
But then I read the interview with Ratliff -- "Clancy Ratliff: Blogger, Scholar... Blogger-Scholar"- by Meredith Graupner and Christine Deneker and put my feet back on the ground. Her suggestion, which I think I'll take up at some point, is not to start one's own blog but to join existing blogging communities. This feels like a good place to start.
How does my rant relate to the question for today? I guess that as I begin to take part in academic blogging communities and not only recognize but value their existence, I will almost certainly develop connections and ideas that I wouldn't otherwise.
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
rhetoric of blogs
I kind of enjoy this feeling of "newness" that entering the blogging world has afforded me. I feel like I'm risking something with each posting -- risking in the sense that I'm not sure if I'm following conventions or not. From the first posting, I recognized in myself a lack of confidence more pronounced that typical writing assignments in a graduate class. With this posting, I am beginning to understand why -- it's because I'm not familiar with the rules; I'm a novice. There, I've said it.
What I'm beginning to understand is that the over-riding rhetorical convention of a blog is its connectedness to other media/sites/blogs. I initially understood it to be a stand-alone journal type document, but different terms from the bloggers glossary site makes clear that a blog without embedded links is no kind of blog at all.
Because of this connectedness, another guiding principle or rhetorical convention has to do with playing fairly -- being "cooperative" -- as stated by Brad Hill in Blogging for Dummies. This means telling the truth, accepting responsibility, making things "right" (or fixing mistakes), giving credit where credit is due, etc.
I also get the idea that blogs should be shorter rather than longer. This means linking to sources rather than quoting them; getting to the point quickly and with as few words a possible; linking to explanations or illustrations rather than providing them within the blog itself.
Finally, there is something about RSS strategies -- which looses me, but which I'm certain is important. I'm hoping for some clarification in class or comments to this blog...
I'm also wondering if these are conventions for all blogs or just more public kinds? I'm thinking about my sister and sister-in-law who use blogs a little differently. Are they breaking conventions or the is the "family" blog another animal altogether?
What I'm beginning to understand is that the over-riding rhetorical convention of a blog is its connectedness to other media/sites/blogs. I initially understood it to be a stand-alone journal type document, but different terms from the bloggers glossary site makes clear that a blog without embedded links is no kind of blog at all.
Because of this connectedness, another guiding principle or rhetorical convention has to do with playing fairly -- being "cooperative" -- as stated by Brad Hill in Blogging for Dummies. This means telling the truth, accepting responsibility, making things "right" (or fixing mistakes), giving credit where credit is due, etc.
I also get the idea that blogs should be shorter rather than longer. This means linking to sources rather than quoting them; getting to the point quickly and with as few words a possible; linking to explanations or illustrations rather than providing them within the blog itself.
Finally, there is something about RSS strategies -- which looses me, but which I'm certain is important. I'm hoping for some clarification in class or comments to this blog...
I'm also wondering if these are conventions for all blogs or just more public kinds? I'm thinking about my sister and sister-in-law who use blogs a little differently. Are they breaking conventions or the is the "family" blog another animal altogether?
Saturday, September 6, 2008
New Media Definition
New Media --from my perspective--refers to media that is
- digital (e.g,the internet, TV broadcasting, satellite radio)
- distributed digitally (e.g., via the internet, TiVo, XM radio)
- by-and-large interactive (e.g., online social networking, online gaming, course management systems, Google Earth, YouTube, blogging)
- accessible (e.g., Web 2.0)
- created and consumed by large chunks of society (e.g., software--like Dreamweaver, FrontPage, Flash--that are not highly technical nor specialized)
- a combination of sound, text, pictures, video (see all examples above) in non-linear ways
These ways of creating, distributing and consuming new media occurs within many various discourses and discourse communities.
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