dmlcentral.net
Teaching, Texting, and Twittering with Obama
With the first year of the Obama administration officially coming to a close, educators have been thinking about how the president’s online presence could be used for both civic education and media literacy purposes. Obama came into office with the promise of delivering web-based participatory democracy or “Government 2.0” to citizens. But I have found myself arguing that Obama’s “embrace” of online practices was actually quite limited, when it came to the messages he was promulgating. I am also not alone in wondering if online commenting and voting really constitutes democratic engagement.… more
Thanks for this interesting post and the links to other projects that are making use of Pres Obama's rhetoric and technology as a way of analyzing both. I'm wondering if anyone has also been studying the link between new and traditional media in this regard, as well as that link for others--such as the Tea Party or Sarah Palin or Scott Brown phenomenon. In other words, I'm wondering how "old media" such as newspapers and cable TV and talk radio disseminate the same or different messages and whether audiences are differentiated? What is the relationship between so-called viral media and broadcast media as a civic message? The "before" and "after" (unedited versus carefully edited) versions of Jon Stewart's appearance on the O'Reilly Show or Fox cutting away from the President's stirring meeting with the Republican Caucus when it wasn't turning out so well for the Caucus make me think that it is also important to teach students about issues of censorship, civic responsibility, communication, audience, and the values (and their corruption) of traditional journalism even as we look at the role of all of these in new media.
Thanks again for such a thoughtful and provocative discussion.
An Emerging Theory: Things Rule
The international conference on Digital Arts and Culture is often a place for previewing coming theoretical trends in digital scholarship. Long before the formation of separate conferences for the Electronic Literature Organization and the Digital Games Research Association, DAC was at the forefront of interactive literature and game studies. This year’s DAC conference, “After Media: Embodiment and Context,” included a prominent “Interdisciplinary Pedagogy” theme led by digital artist Cynthia Beth Rubin that tried to make connections between the cutting-edge, sophisticated theory that the conference represented and the more mundane practical challenges posed by instructional technology and augmented classroom learning. One of the plenary speakers, Ian Bogost, summed up the mood at DAC succinctly on his Twitter feed: “Things rule!” Bogost has become known internationally as a proponent of a radical contemporary philosophical school known as “speculative realism” or “speculative materialism," and several talks at the conference reflected aspects of this revolutionary thing-centric attitude.… more
On Gaming, Politics, and Reform
As the new year rolls around, like many political science professors, Kareem Crayton is thinking about the possible repercussions of next year’s 2010 census and what he calls the “opening skirmishes” of the partisan fight over “who’s going to be counted” and where the boundaries of congressional districts should be drawn for the next decade. However, since working on the civic education website, The Redistricting Game, with a team of interactive media designers at the University of Southern California, Crayton’s attitudes about collaboration within the academy and participation in broader political conversations probably differ somewhat from those of his more traditional peers who still communicate their ideas about systems of representative democracy only through scholarly publication in print media. Crayton suggests that The Redistricting Game could also inspire average voters to play a more creative role in legislative problem-solving. “All the ideas about transforming our political system don’t need to emanate from the state house or the university.”… more
Western Washington University's Center for Law, Diversity and Justice, Fairhaven College, and the WWU Political Science Department will host a pair of presentations on Tuesday, Oct. 21 on topics with a common theme of elections and social justice.
Both events are free and open to the public, and are co-sponsored by the American Democracy Project; AS Civil Controversy, AS Social Issues and Western Votes.
The presentations, given by Professor Kareem Crayton of the University of Southern California's Gould School of Law, are:
* 12:30-2 p.m., Environmental Science 313 - "A New Day in Racial Politics: Understanding Bartlett vs. Strickland."
* 7-8:30 p.m., Communications Facility 115 - "Hopes and Fears of the 2008 Elections."
Kareem Crayton is an expert specializing on issues related to the intersection of law, politics, and race. His academic work explores redistricting, the political representation of racial minorities, and the emerging democracy in South Africa. At USC Law, he teaches Civil Procedure, Election Law and Comparative Constitutional Law. Crayton also holds an appointment in USC's Department of Political Science, where he teaches the undergraduate courses Civil Rights & Civil Liberties as well as The Politics of the American City. Crayton is also a principal research consultant on the design of a computer website, www.redistrictinggame.com, to educate the public about redistricting reform.
mcafee certification