Week 12--Blogging On

So I know this is coming rather late, but since crying in front of everyone in class it has taken me awhile to muster up the courage to get this out.

Firstly, I never would have opened my mouth in class had I known how I would have reacted. It was one of those times where you don't realize how much something affects you until it's too late.

Now onto the explanation? Or whatever it is that I should call this.

I don't even know where to begin. I guess the best way to describe my food situation would be an utter lack of freedom. I can't try new foods, I can't go anyway without a pound of medication, I have to be that awful American tourist who doesn't eat the native dishes, I can't warm up after a cold day with a bowl of soup.

More than the lack of freedom, the guilt eats (pun not intended) away at me daily. I'm used to watching my step, I'm used to my lack of choices.  However, I will never get used to the sacrifices my family and friends have to make. And it's only gotten worse since I arrived at Bryn Mawr.

Especially in recent years the guilt has been unbearable. With the world slowly going greener has come the vegetarian and vegan movement. (Needless to say these are not, nor will they ever be options for me.)  Bryn Mawr has embraced this movement. Which sucks for me a lot. I'm not even supposed to eat in Haffner because of how much vegan cooking is done there. I work in Haffner and on many days it's the only dining hall that is open when I have time to eat. So basically I'm just rolling the dice every day I eat lunch. Not only that, but I'm really worried that the world is going to continue to go down this meatless path that seems so popular these days. If this happens I would die. Literally. The worst part is that I don't even like meat. I even tried to be a vegetarian (before I stopped being ridiculous and started being healthy again). 

I guess in some ways it all comes down to the fact that I feel judged for what I eat and I don't think that's fair since I don't really have a choice. 

So next time you see that awful American tourist, remember me.

Thanks for listening to me complain. I kind of hope no one reads this. It doesn't really feel like I want it to. 

I do promise to actually come back and post/reply to something REAL, but for now, the notes.

Tuesday: Tim Burke- Citizen Intellectual (as he was introduced) - WARNING:these notes are unchronological and somewhat incomplete (as are all things?). I refer you to Anne Dalke's notes

The last two examples of things we should read: people being malicious or contradictory? Malicious if they're just "trying to win the argument" rather than keep it going, or are chameleonically changing and using you as a means to their own ends-- even on the internet, we're all "performing selves" and as we get older/more experienced, we can see clues to what doesn't belong/ what isn't true to a person.

Communities that are formed around blogs show a loyalty and like-mindedness where The Other (the newcomer with a different view) ends up having a Punch and Judy show interaction in the comments instead of useful dialogue.

But at that rate, if the point is to establish a conversation- with people of different views coming together- rather than to manipulate others into following your own view, are these internet communities around blogs not the way to go about it?

The more personal blogs, written mostly by women, seem to get the kind of community Tim wants: one that shares their experiences.

But then there's the problem of authority: who has the authority to talk about different subjects? When blogging about Zimbabwe, he finds that people see him as an expert and want his opinion on what is going to happen and rarely has anyone contradict him.

Should academic or experiential win out as a justification for opinion (essay by Joan Scott: "Experience") ? Experience shouldn't be labeled as the right opinion enough to stop a conversation.

This ties in further with anonymity on the net which Louisa brought up and Al's question on what gives people the "right" to be named. Also, anonymity gives a sort of freedom to talk about certain things (like the inner workings of the tenure process) and both takes and gives authority to the writer, as their background is unknown.

A big reason that Easily Distracted exists is because of unhappiness with the academy, which got into the discussion of different university types and their potentials-- which led to musing on the differences between the humanities and the sciences.

Thursday: Kate Thomas: Syllabub [Anne brought fantastic lemon bars and carbonated juice and water, so 'tis a shame if anyone missed out]. Again, I refer you further to Anne Dalke's notes.

She's writing from a history of this immediacy of information dispersion as her studies of 19th century communication technologies shows. Just as an empire which grows steadily larger (England) needs to disseminate information more quickly and over a wider space, the internet is serving that function. To this extent, her "blogging" isn't a new phenomenon, but rather old-fashioned. It has a journal/column sort of feel in contrast to Tim Burke's and other blogs. Also, she began the concept of blogging/registering the blog with the idea of perhaps becoming a restaurant reviewer in mind.

Her blog is not overly link-laden, so is that a reason why she doesn't think of herself or her blog as "bloggy"? Or is extensive linking just part of the internet and it's super-connectivity? The few people linked on her website are mostly food people/an artist friend. Must link to people who link to you out of courtesy? How to respond to comments in the blog?: a big response to everyone at once, or to each specifically, chivalrous to respond? If don't respond to everyone, can one be a good "citizen" like the Becks and Posh blogger in San Francisco?

Back to the restaurant reviewer concept: problems with writing about local things on a non-local forum and the judgement inherent. Her blog is a way to get away from the academy (and archive), not to evaluate other things. That is why there aren't any political views or agendas. pushed on the blog, even though she has them and some personal comments are made within the characters she has made to populate the blog. It also allows the instant gratification of publishing without extensive peer review and writing for the sake of writing. Blog was not used when came up for tenure.

A reader tracked down her Bryn Mawr e-mail address and asked if she was Syllabub. Among other issues, Anne asked if she was Syllabub, which brought about: How much of one's personal life should one share on the blog? No names of self or B. Profile is blank. Also, a tie back to sort of nostalgic novels. All just a slice of self, which still gives character and personality with enough interest to keep the readers hooked, but without overloading the personal history.

Alienated from our food and academia."The Incredible Shrinking Public Sphere". Will the internet and blogs be able to help?

Starts writing when the URGE to write an entry appears. Then, a food inspires. Does research. Writes it all in about 8 hours at one go with heavy editing (specific attention to the feel of the writing). Edits again once it's in its "published form" before RSS feed readers are notified.

Variety of different class responses to her blog- and a short talk about food politics followed.

I also wanted to mention about Kate Thomas's blog and talk in class:

She mentioned that one thing she didn't like at first about blogging is the ephemeral quality, that she felt she was just adding to the debris on the Internet. This is sort of paradoxical in that what she (or anyone) writes on a blog is ephemeral only in that it gets buried under the multitude of what other people write, so it remains to be easily seen only for a short amount of time. But really it's there for a long time; at least to my understanding, it's hard to get rid of something you've posted on the internet. Is a blog, then, an "ephemeral archive"? Seems like an oxymoron, but at the same time kind of fitting.

Second thing, we talked about how blogs are an improvement on academic writing in that they are instantaneous, and there is no separation of years between writing and publication. In between writing and publication of an academic piece, the writing often becomes "alien" to the author. This is very similar to we're talking about in another of my classes on Jorge Luis Borges, who writes a lot about the disconnect between the writer and his/her writing, and between past and present selves. He felt as though the writing he did when he was 20 might as well have been written by a completely different person than the person he was at 70--but also that nothing he wrote could express who he really was.

I'm wondering now if this inability to express his true self through writing was due to a Derridean sense of the inadequacy of words as signifiers, or because every second changed him into a different person. That his thoughts were "redefining" him (in the way Calderon suggests above) constantly, so he could never read his own writing and totally identify with it. Maybe this sense of alienation from academic writing is only a more noticeable (because the span of time is longer) form of this alienation form all writing that Borges felt. This is less of a bloggy question than a textual one in general, I guess.

Hello all. The goal of this challenge is to experiment with the class blog and turn it into something new and different that will hopefully help us better understand the strange creature that is a blog. I don’t, by any means, claim to be an expert on blogging. I merely believe in it whole-heartedly. So, I took the time to create this little challenge in the hope of sharing and spreading this passion with others. I hope that you enjoy it, find it interesting, and are inspired by it.

You really only need to look at the three challenges themselves. My thoughts are below to help clarify, inspire, explain, and link ideas from class. Sorry about this--I can't help writing so much!

(1) Make a normal-length post about a topic that interests you.

The key here is that your post does not have to be about anything in class—although it can be. Write about fashion, science, a current event, morality, politics, sex, life, anything that you would want to write about if you had your own blog. Write the post to a worldwide audience. Make sure that you choose something that you really would like to write about; passion shows through your writing and if its not there, we will probably be able to tell. If you are having trouble, spend more time thinking about something to write about. Take your time.

Why post? An author’s posts are the backbone of the blog. Because this challenge is a first-hand exploration of the structure and short term evolution of a blog from the perspective of both the “poster” and the “replier,” it is important for the people who have never done one or the other (or either) to experience them both.

(2) Post at least one reply to at least three different posts made by other people—leaving you with at least three separate replies, each on a different post. Click ‘reply’ below the person’s post so we know which post you are referring to.

Read the post well before you reply. Your replies need not be very long; one sentence can be a beautiful addition to a collection of opinions. That one sentence can also spark a whole new range of other opinions! Yet, you should also think of your comment as a continuation of the post itself (or of someone else’s comment). Try adding information on the topic, a helpful resource, or an underrepresented opinion.

Why reply? We talked about the importance of feedback as part of the blogging genre. Although not all blogs include an external comment option, comments can be very important to the general feel of many popular blogs. My intention for this part of the challenge is to help the people in the class who are not familiar with blogging experience a different type of writing than what has previously been explored in the class. Reading and developing a coherent thought on someone else’s work is something we have all experienced, but the fun with the blogging/commenting structure is that it is a much less formal atmosphere that has no set path or destination; you never know where the comments will take the discussion!

(3) Keep an eye out on the blog over the next few weeks. Make a mental note on how the blog evolves and grows.

Can you infer anything about the blogger from reading their post? What can you learn about the blogger when looking at where their replies lay or what their replies contain? Where is the final destination for each posting? Unlike a book or a work of theatre or a newspaper article, there is no end to the story; it will continue as long as there are people out there with something else to say on the topic. How has working on this challenge changed your perception of how the genre of a blog is characterized? How does this week’s blogging experience compare to the structure of the past 11 weeks?

Why watch? It is really interesting to cruise through a wide variety of posts and replies. Our Emerging Genres class often talks about the overall path that genres follow. I think that this will be an important step in tying the blogging experience in with the previous explorations relating the reader to the writer.

I know that this will not be new for all of you, but I also know that it will be for others. Have fun with it. If you are a novice, find a way to surprise yourself! If you are well-versed in the blogging world, prove it by finding a way to surprise everyone else! But most of all, enjoy yourself.  Hell, you could even post about how much you hate the assignment (hopefully I took the originality out of that option by beating you to it, haha!)

Explore!

Christina Harview