Social Media and Academics- 10/31 Blog Response
¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 1 As both Gannon and the anonymous writer in The Guardian point out, social media can be used for good things and bad things. Because of social media’s tendency to lend itself to distractedness, an open forum feel, and arguments (so many arguments), it is divisive in its very nature. If I were a commenter in Gannon’s thread, I would feel the need to “take a side” because I believe in the transformative power of social media. While certain things may be flashes in the pan, social media as a whole is going to be around for the foreseeable future. Perhaps it is because I am a millennial, but I believe, if used correctly, social media can allow for worldwide discussion of things and ideas which normally would only be restricted to those able to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars attending academic conferences.
¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 1 I believe in defending social media from those who say it has no use in academics, but I do acknowledge it should not be used as the primary means of evaluation of a scholar, and I don’t believe it should be used by an interviewer to see how active somebody is in their research. It should be used as a supplement to academic thought, not as a substitution for it.
¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 2 I believe digital scholarship does value immediacy in some way, although it is not necessarily detrimental to traditional academic scholarship. If a scholar is posting a blog article it is certainly going to be read faster and, as Gannon points out, probably by more people than it would if it were published in a scholarly journal. The wide reach of social media allows for more conversation about these topics, which should be a good thing. The immediate discussion and readership in social media discussion allows the writer to be more gratified immediately in knowing so many people have read their work. However, the web-based discourse also seems to allow more semi-malicious commenting and discussing than normal. Even when an article or post isn’t posted anonymously, even when there is a name attached to the piece, the nature of web-based discussion seems to have less civility than in-person discussion because of the level of detachment the Internet provides, which is where the phrase “keyboard warrior” comes from.
I feel like you’re spinning your wheels a bit in this first paragraph, and I’d like to see you dive in and arrive more quickly at a point or position. Quoting directly from one of the articles, or responding to an individual point / claim, might help you to do that.