Mock Thesis Defense: Justifying Blogging When I Could Be Revising Essays

I have a serious need to repent.  I intended to write this post over a week ago, but here we are.  Let's be honest-I just collapsed after finals and fell off the radar.  But now it is time to get back in the game, and without further delay because my honors thesis is due January 16th.

I want to take a minute and comment on what I have learned from my mock thesis defense and from my latest post that goes over a draft of my final essay in my collection, "Snot and Untold Stories."  The mock thesis defense was done as a final presentation in my Thesis Writing class.  Another student who acted as my representative contacted Professor Burton and received some good questions to ask me, one of which was this: how do I justify spending valuable time blogging and focusing on the digital component of my thesis when I could spend that time doing much-needed revising?

It is a good question, and after my latest post highlighting concerns with my essay I am more equipped to answer it.

Since posting my latest draft, I have received a few great comments with invaluable feedback.  While I admit I have not had as many people comment as I would have liked, the comments I did receive were incredible.  Shara, who I connected with while in India, took a good chunk of time to give me some much-needed suggestions.  Had I not blogged about this draft, I would not have received that feedback.  In this case, blogging has actually aided me in the traditional revision process.

A second, less obvious benefit to blogging that I have discovered within the last few weeks, has been that I am held accountable to a "real" audience.  Within a day after posting my essay, the German friend I met on the bus mentioned in my essay, who I renamed Charley, contacted me and mentioned he read it.  My initial reaction was concern.  Had I really represented him accurately?  For all of my talk of authenticity, was I holding to it?  The truth is I fused a little bit of a later conversation I had with a history major friend to include a few of the Vietnam details.  By having this post I am acknowledging the fragile nature of storytelling while also being held accountable to an immediate audience.  This is not available in mainstream publishing.

In conclusion, while blogging and adding this digital component of my thesis can be time consuming and daunting, I am glad to have done it.  At the end of the day I would rather have my ideas shared and available to read than have them be perfect.

(Photo credit goes to cs.cmu.edu)

Discovering Twitter

Talking with Dr. Burton last week helped me understand how Twitter is a great social media resource to help me get connected with a potential audience for my eBook.  It is also a great way to find out what kinds of discussions are out there so that I can stay in the loop.  Here is a link to my profile.

Until last week I have always been a little resistant to get a Twitter account.  Isn't it just a great big Facebook status update rave?  I’m no Pynchon, but I do appreciate a little anonymity.  No one needs to hear what I ate for breakfast this morning…

But that was the same argument that I originally had against blogging, only to find that academic blogging offers a whole range of possibilities that I had not considered.  So it is with Twitter.

While being real on Twitter and having a personality is important when Tweeting, Dr. Burton helped me realize that there are ways to ensure that I am posting valuable material that others would be interested in.  I just have to think of it from their perspective and try to Tweet valuable information.  There needs to be a healthy blend between personality and focus.  Reposting blog entries, links, videos, and retweets are a great way to start.   It is also nice to attend events and comment on them while you are there.  Photos, which are something which is pretty applicable to my interests, are also easily shared on Twitter.  This means I’m probably going to visit the gravesite of my old Flickr account and update, update, update.

Why I Switched to an eReader (And why Nook Color instead of a Kindle)

In light of some of my realizations about “going digital,” I thought I would dedicate a post to talking about how I converted to a Nook Color eReader.    

Like most of us (I think), I was a little apprehensive about the switch.  It was not an easy decision.  I love the feel of books.  I love the way they smell and being able to scribble in the margins and turn the pages to my heart’s content.  I disliked reading anything on a computer monitor, and was irritated that some books are actually more expensive in an eBook format than the regular used print editions on Amazon.  

So what changed?

Honestly, I think I was forced to reconsider since I was going to India and had fourteen books I was supposed to take with me.  When you plan on backpacking all over India and Europe, carrying that much weight is suicide.  I thought a lot about the Amazon Kindle but ended up getting a Nook Color based on this review that my dad sent me from the Chicago Times.

The review is great, but I thought I would give my own thoughts on owning a Nook Color and how it has changed my reading experience.

Social Media vs Conventional Academia?

Since coming home from India I have given a lot more thought to this whole social media question in an educational setting.  Until recently I did not realize that sometimes my thoughts on the benefits of the emerging digital culture are not just different from conventional forms of learning, but they are in outright opposition to the traditional education model. 

The first week of school I picked up a copy of the Daily Universe and noted the first page article, “BYU professors turning to social media.”  Because this is in my realm of interests and I have had a great experience with it in India and Ghana, I picked it up.

I was disappointed by the article.  I think it was nice that it addressed the growing social media in classroom question, but in many ways it seemed very surface level—making me think that in general we have not fully grasped the benefits linked with social media for educational purposes.  While there were a few references to an online discussion, the article did not seem to hint that this online discussion could be held with others outside of the classroom and in the real world.  Facebook was the only type of media mentioned, which was discredited as a way for teachers to creep on students and even cause some distraction, where other resources, such as academic blogs, were not even mentioned.  Professor Parker, a religious professor, mentioned that he does not “see social media playing a large role” in any of his classes,” and I think many professors are in that line of thinking.