Self-editing
Posted by susankmiller on August 21, 2008
I haven’t posted to my blog lately because I self-edit too much. I’ve started dozens of blog entries and then deleted them because I didn’t think that I had anything relevant to add to the blogosphere. Why clutter it up anymore than it already is? And then sometimes I wonder what others will think about what I have to say. Blogging and social networking can bring back tons of self-absorbed middle-school neuroses.
But seriously, why should I care? How many people really find one lonely little blog? And of those who do read it, does it matter whether or not they find what I write to be enlightening? That’s the beauty of the internet, isn’t it? We vote with our mouse. If we don’t like something, we go elsewhere.
This has made me wonder, though: How does blogging cause us to rethink what we write about, who we share it with, how we represent ourselves, and how others might perceive what they read? Why do people blog? What’s appropriate to blog about? Are there things that should just be kept private? But then there are private blogs for that, right? I guess I just don’t get the point of those. Perhaps someone else can help me understand?
In my graduate class, I require my students to keep blogs. But I can’t decide how I feel about the educational potential of blogging–is it inappropriate to coerce someone into blogging? Is there a unique potential learning experience that can only be found through blogging? Maybe I’m overthinking it. Or maybe I’m just too darn skeptical.
August 24th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
I feel the same way about both blogging and commenting on blogs. But I’m hear reading and commenting so obviously I think I have something to say
I like the practice of writing everyday and for that I think it’s good for students too, but I wonder if they just consider it performative writing. Unfortunate. And then there’s the Dali Lama’s suggestion complicating my urge to blog: speak (or write?) only when what you have to say is true, kind, and necessary. My husband’s retort: no one would ever say anything then.
August 26th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
“is it inappropriate to coerce someone into blogging?”
I think the readings for the current batch of graduate students gives you a solid answer. Forcing students to blog is a clearly also forcing them to submit to your authority as instructor and treat their blogs as “disciplinary technologies” (this is Hawisher/Selfe 42ff). Does that make it wrong? Not if you own the ab/use of authority and the way your students will “self-discipline themselves and their prose in ways they consider socially and educationally appropriate” (43). Getting graduate students to write constantly is a good thing. Should they be required to force such writing through an authority figure and, with blogs, make hours of composition public for not just the authority figure & peers but, in most practical cases, potentially-if-not-likely the world? Possibly not. Private writing can be a productive part of any academic’s repertoire. I’d argue it’s an essential one.
(And don’t underestimate the value of the “if-not-likely-world.” That simply represents an anonymous audience. I mean seriously, do I want to say exactly what I think about some scholars’ work online, where they might be able to Google up my comments if they’re bored and curious (as I sometimes am — heck, I found I was used in a syllabus locally, and it’s hard not to ask how badly I was slammed)? Often the answer is no, I’d rather think about it privately for a while and come to a conclusion I can hold for months before “publishing” hard critiques — and I’d consider myself one of the braver souls.)
“Is there a unique potential learning experience that can only be found through blogging?”
Honestly (aka, YMMV), only one: Learning how to use a blog.
August 26th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
You make some really useful points, Ruffin. Perhaps the answer is to let students set the privacy of their blogs in a way that makes them feel comfortable–and perhaps to also have them talk about why they made the choices they did, at least in a class about pedagogy and technology. I don’t think there’s any way to get around the authority issue in a classroom setting, though–not entirely. Even if a blog written for a class is private, the instructor is still reading and assessing in some way. No matter what we do to try to make spaces more egalitarian, there’s always someone who assigns a grade at the end of the class. No matter how much I’d like to do away with grading, we’re stuck with a system that rewards performances. Any suggested solutions?