When I began graduate school, which seems like eons ago, I was the epitome of a lost puppy.  I had been out of school for six years, and it had taken me 17 years to earn that ever elusive bachelors degree. 

I know that I spent the first two years floundering.  I ended up doing my masters thesis on three of Charles Dickens Christmas tales: a dream come true for me.  I had always loved the works of Dickens and it was his humor in A Christmas Carol that had hooked me.

When I began my PhD though, it didn't feel right to continue down the path of Victorian literature.  Don't get me wrong, it is my favorite literature, but it left me feeling partially empty.  I knew what the problem was, and I worried that I had taken the wrong path by going back to school.  There is no doubt that I love writing and that I thoroughly enjoy teaching writing to freshman, but I need more.  I need to somehow also be immersed in technology. 

Luckily for me, two of my mentors in grad school steered me in a good direction when they suggested I look into doing a dissertation that combined writing and technology.  That, in my book, was a win-win situation and a totally Lost Puppy finally found a home in writing and computers.

So fast-forward to now, and I find myself faced with the challenge of teaching web authoring, and I'm loving the things I am reading that deal with the importance of the WRITING in web design.  As Derek Powazek argues in his article "Calling All Designers: Learn to Write!", "it's time we designers stop thinking of ourselves as merely pixel people, and start thinking of ourselves as the creators of experiences" ("Calling All Designers").  This is exactly what I'm talking about.  There is a place for those of us who are nerds, geeks, techno bobble-heads AND love writing.

Powazek goes so far as to advise would be employers that "if your designer says, 'I'm not a writer.' it may be time to find one who is" ("Calling All Designers").  I couldn't agree with him more.  Sites do not have to be impersonal places with stiff and unfriendly language.  They can be places that are inviting and that have personality (see yesterday's post).  If you are a techno Bobble-head who loves designing websites, take it to the next level and let your personality influence your text.  It's a brave new world out there for those willing to embark on the journey.  Are you up for the challenge?

When I read Jason Whittaker's book, what seems like months ago, I was a little, well really a lot, disappointed on how he handled the writing aspect of web design.  If you read back, he commented more than I thought necessary on grammar issues.  While these things are certainly important in the final output, they cleraly should not be the first thing or the most important thing.  In fact, a minor mention would be more than enough to get the point across.

So I was pleased, well really happy, when I read Bronwyn Jones' article on the Web entitled "Better Writing Through Design."  To be honest, I didn't know what to expect from the title, but I feared that there would be mentions of close editing and grammar checking.  In reality, Jones discusses the fact that everything on a web page communicates: the navigation, the colors, the images, everything, and that includes the written text.  Jones argues that if you "apply a design process to your words as well as your images . . . you just may fine your voice" ("Better Writing"). 

Even though the article is short, Jones makes clear, concise points about the importance of content in web design.  He also points out repeatedly the importance of audience, listing 5 questions that you should keep in mind when both designing and writing.  As Jones points out, you need to give your readers an identity they can connect with, not some artificial voice to which no one can relate.

Bottom line: you need to be more concerned with content rather than mechanics, and you gotta keep it real!!

Me: "The Web is Dead!"
She (me's alter ego)": laughs
Me: "No, really, it's DEAD"
She: "Yea, right!"
Me: stomps my proverbial foot and storms off (no, wait, I can't storm away from my alter ego... can I?)

When I read the cover of Wired's issue this month, I wondered what editor would allow a piece to be published that proclaimed the death of the Web.  And after reading the article, which was written by two authors, I found that Chris Anderson basically reneged the death toll when he states "Ecommerce continues to thrive on the Web, and no company is going to shut its Web site as an information resource.  More important, the great virtue of today's Web [which would indicate it's not dead] is that so much of it is noncommercial" (164). 

I first heard of this proclamation of death to the Web on NPR when they interviewed one of the writers.  I listened, carefully, I thought, but I did not understand his definitions or explanations as to why he and others thought the Web was officially dead.  The article is divided into the two parts.  One is "Who's to Blame: Them" and the other is Who's to Blame: Us."  I chose to read the "Them" section first and was still pretty clueless at the end, but then I read the "Us" part and it all began to come together.

The fact of the matter is we spend a lot less time surfing and a lot more time picking up our smart phones and iPads and launching Apps to do the things we want to do.  Anderson reports that "Morgan Stanley projects [that] the number of users accessing the Net from mobile devices will surpass the number who access it from PCs" in five years (125).  One point to keep in mind is that the Web is not to be confused with the Internet, which existed long before the Web.  All of these devices use the Internet to receive their information, but that is not the Web.

Is the Web dead though?  Hardly.  People still use browsers to do research and people are still Googling their little collective hearts out.  What it will be in five years, I have no idea.  I had no idea it would ever make it this far from it's rocky beginnings.  But at one point and time theorists wanted to proclaim that the author was dead, so I guess Wired can proclaim that the Web is dead if they so desire.

I've just finished reading, finally, a very long chapter in Axel Bruns book, Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life, and Beyond, entitled "Wikipedia: Representations of Knowledge."  First, let me say that I chose the comic above, perhaps a negative view of Wikipedia, on purpose.  Not because this is what I think of it, but because I believe many do. 

I learned a lot about Wikipedia in this chapter: about how it fits the produsage model and about how it differs from traditional encyclopedias (much the same way that citizen journalism differs from traditional journalism).  And I could go on about that for at least half a page, but that is not what really caught my attention, and if you been reading about produsage in this blog for a while, then you too can figure out how Wikipedia fits this model.

What caught my attention was when Bruns quotes [b]oyd as arguing that "'many librarians, teachers and academics fear Wikipedia (not dislike it) because it is not properly understood, not simply because it challenges their privilege, just as most new systems and media are feared by traditionalists of all sorts'" (130).  Amen brother.  Bruns then points out that "it is incumbent on teachers and academics to make their students familiar with the inherent shortcomings of any of the research tools and sources they may be tempted to utilize" (132).

I can't tell you how many times I have sat with a group of peers who criticize the fact that students use Wikipedia as a resource at all.  We fear what we do not understand, and many do not understand the fact that a community of users can create content and edit it pretty much at will.  Are there things that are misrepresented?  Hell yes, but aren't there plenty of "facts" in encyclopedias that have been changed over the years?  Bruns makes a point of saying that encyclopedias aim to "encapsulate the current state of accepted knowledge" while Wikipedia attempts to present a "representation of knowledge" (103).  Put another way, encyclopedias attempt to portray a "universal truth" as determined by "dead white guys" while Wikipedia attempts to represent a living and diverse knowledge.

We are always talking about valuing the knowledge with which our students walk into our classrooms.  This knowledge is a living knowledge.  It is growing and morphing everyday.  Instead of banning the use of Wikipedia, why don't we use it to help them develop critical reading and thinking skills?  Why don't we educate them on ways of determining if an entry on the website is reliable?  If we are asking them to do research, is it too much to actually "teach" them how to do that research?  It's not gonna help them if we just BAN the use of Wikipedia because it sometimes has mistakes.  That's like asking you parents "Why" and them telling you because it's bad without ever sitting you down and explaining what exactly is "bad" about it.  And not ALL of Wikipedia is "bad."  There is actually quite a bit that is good about it.  And if they are using it, then we need to help them learn how to use it effectively.  Not just tell them they can't because it's BAD!!

"Citizen journalism in all its forms, as it has emerged and developed during the first decade of the twenty-first century, is driven by similar motivations: it, too, acts as a concrete and a supplement to the output of commercial, industrial journalism" (69).  At least, according to Axel Bruns in Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life, and Beyond.  When I read this, though, the first thing that came to mind was the latest reports in "citizen journalism" that Bill Cosby had died.  And this is not the first time that rumor has started.

However, after reading the entire chapter on "News Blogs and Citizen Journalism: Perpetual Collaboration in Evaluating the News," I began to see the value in what Bruns refers to as the produsage in journalism.  He describes the difference between gatekeeping in traditional journalism and gatewatching in citizen journalism.  He also takes the four key elements of produsage--open participation and communal evaluation, fluid heterarchy and ad hoc meritocracy, unfinished artefacts and continuing process, and common property and individual rewards--and explains how citizen journalism, like open source software, meets all of these key principles. 

I would say the most important element in gatewatching is that news is put out there first, and then critiqued and discussed second.  This is not the way traditional journalism works at all.  In the traditional form, news has to be deemed worthy by editors before it ever makes it out the door (gatekeeping).  The other most interesting factor is that the news does not die once it is reported.  Once the news is reported in citizen journalism, it is discussed, added to, and perhaps debated.  It does not just die.  Often, related stories or issues are added to it and thus the story lives on for much longer than traditional journalism.

These are the points that I would say I found the most interesting.  News is definitely changing, and traditional journalism needs to change with it.  If they refuse to, chances are they will have a difficult time surviving in the twenty-first century.  And, as Willis notes, "'eventually, licensing and copyright policies will need to be reexamined to come into harmony with a collaborative audience model" (qtd in Bruns 94).  No longer is the professional trained journalist the end all be all of knowledge: the audience also has a voice, and the two need to come together.

Are we not all broken in one way or another?  Is it not true that from the moment we breach our mother's wombs we are broken?  Is not the harsh reality of leaving our water paradise to be thrust into the cold world not a breaking of sorts?

Mark W. Bundy, the author of "'Know Me Unbroken': Peeling Back the Silenced Rind of the Queer Mouth", wishes to know Gloria Anzaldua unbroken "just as Maria Lugones wants all muted women 'to be seen unbroken'" (qtd. in Bundy 139).  Bundy's article is lyrical/poetical at times with his use of imagery and rhythm.  But I keep asking myself what is my reaction to the piece?  What have I taken away from my reading? 

Language.

The beauty of language.  The ability of language to build bridges through its human use.  These are things that I absorbed in my reading.  When discussing Anzaldua's use of language, Bundy writes: "These ongoing harvestings of yours, Gloria.  Peeling it all back--culture, self, body, voice, sex, identity, meaning, realities, love, illness, recover" (140).  All things can be discovered and known through language.  Understanding can occur through language and its use. 

If we are silent in our anguish, our fear, our anger, our love, our passion, how will anyone understand?  We need to make room for everyone's language, not just mine, not just yours: and yet, mine and yours.  In the words of the Na'vi (Avatar) "I see you."  That is what we should all be striving for by listening to the language of others.

This is my third attempt at this post.  The other two got wiped out when my browser launched a link in this same window,  When you go back, it's all gone.  Hopefully, the third time is the charm.

It is the 19th of August, and in 13 short days, I will begin teaching an Intro to Web Authoring class for MSU's Professional Writing program.  This is a class I have never taught before, so I though perhaps I should begin reading the textbook, Jeffery Zeldman and Ethan Marcotte's Designing with Web Standards, that is the required text.  When I read Zeldman and Marcotte's claim that standards created by organizations such as W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) "make it possible to design sites that will continue to work, even as those standards and browsers evolve" (4), I thought, "yea right, I doubt that seriously."

I mean come on..... even the authors claim that "most of us [web authors] agree that even the latest version of Internet Explorer, while very good, is not as advanced as Safari, Firefox, and Opera" (8).  Personally, I don't find Safari all that great either!! 

But the good news is that we are so much better off than we were in the beginning.  I mean come on now, seriously, we've only been doing this..... what, 20, 25 years?  Some of you may remember the proprietary (never a good word when it comes to technology) wars between IE and Netscape.  Chances are if you could view the web page on IE than you wouldn't be able to see it in Netscape and vice versa.  This is probably why many of us thought this "Web" thing would probably not make it for very long.

But now browsers play nicer and designers are attempting to follow the standards closer.  It will be interesting to see how the authors lead us through these standards.  My class will not be reading the entire text, as it's one that they will also use in the next class, but we will hit on many of the basics.  Onward!

I read an interesting article today entitled "Building a Brilliant Book Proposal: Lose the Fear of Book Proposals" by Shaunna Privratsky.  I have read two books on how to write a book proposal, and Privratsky manages in 1 1/2 pages to summarize every important detail I learned in those two books.

Bottom line, if you have a book that you just haven't gotten up the nerve to seek out a publisher for because you did not know how or were afraid to write the book proposal, this article should give you the information you need to get started.  I'm not saying that you will not have to consult a book sooner or later to finish the task, but this information will definitely get you started.

So, if the article is so great, why would you have to consult another text, right?  Even though this article gives you all the information on "content" (which is the most important thing, right), it does not list the nitty-gritty details of formatting and putting it all together.  For that, you definitely need to consult one of the many books on the market that often have appendices with example book proposals.  When it comes to content though, this short article lays it all out in an easy to read, concise way.  I only wish I had read it before reading the other two books from cover to cover.

According to Lorin Schwarz, arts-informed research "holds within it an imperative not only to question its own completeness and objectivity, but also to 'speak back' to forms of authority that have traditionally silenced and left out voices that either don't fit, refuse to offer a definitive answer or that demand emotional knowing in order to understand what they feel compelled to say" (29).  Schwarz, in her article "'Not My Scene': Queer Auto-Ethnography as Alternative Research Method." argues that research can benefit from this type of methodology.

How does one reflect on something as profound and somewhat mind-boggling as the concept that some topics are enhanced by this type of methodology?  When I contemplate this method, I envision this diagram that I found online:

With this type of research, things that would otherwise be left unnoticed are brought to light: the "human" elements that are not, scratch that, NEVER black and white.  Schwarz argues that this type of research "provides a critical foundation to question the structures we take for granted in often unexamined dualisms of 'black and white' thinking" (29).  Humanity, when viewed as black and white, becomes this rigid, unbending thing that breaks when the slightest pressure is put on it.  This type of research allows the researcher and the audience to see things in shades of gray.

Schwarz demonstrates her arts-informed research with a play.  A one man act that explores what one man feels when he sees other happy gay men together.  This is the type of auto-ethnography that perhaps no other type of research can get at at this depth.  Some of the passages get at the depth of human existence in a way that regular, black and white, research never could.

I've decided I need a mini-vacation from . . . well, everything!!  That includes my reading and blogging.  So, until next week, see you on the flip side!!