Project Online Activism

To gain perspective on online activism, my online composition II class read "Hashtag Activism" and "Politics of the Internet." Most students related to the article, "Hashtag Activism," which states: "The ongoing referendum on the Web often seems more like a kind of collective digital graffiti than a measure of engagement: I saw this thing, it spoke to me for at least one second, and here is my mark to prove it." It recognizes that social media is a tool, which purpose is driven by the one operating the mouse. Liking something on Facebook is not going to make you an activist. However, if you are an activist, Facebook can help you generate support and awareness. The article many examples proving the power of social media in the right collective hands, such as how an online petition changed the film rating of the documentary Bully from R to PG.

 The "Politics of the Internet," for me, was the more interesting read. It correlates the design of the Internet to philosophical principles that could reshape politics:

•                The internet is nothing if not an exercise in interconnection. Its politics thus seems to call out for a similar convergence, and connections between the disparate interest groups that make up the net movement are indeed getting stronger. Beyond specific links, they also share what Manuel Castells, a Spanish sociologist, calls the “culture of the internet”, a contemporary equivalent of the 1960s counter-culture (in which much of the environmental movement grew up). Its members believe in technological progress, the free flow of information, virtual communities and entrepreneurialism. They meet at “unconferences” (where delegates make up their own agenda) and “hackerspaces” (originally opportunities to tinker with electronics); their online                forum of choice will typically be something such as a wiki that all can contribute to and help to shape. ("The New Politics of the Internet: Everything is Connected")

It's an interesting piece that is grounded in free data optimism. Most interesting is that the piece in The Economist only discusses economical concerns in relation to intellectual property rights. It doesn't examine the hidden cost of free data -- our attention. But I digress... ah yes, online activism. Our journey should begin in full-fledged splendor after spring break.

Here is the assignment:

As we research our causes and later argue for solutions, I want us to document and promote our findings online. Online activism can take many forms through social media, blogging, website creation, petitions, videos, and memes. Because of the various options and because we will be working independently, I will expect you to keep track of your posts, Tweets, and work to submit in a portfolio on April 18th. For blogs, all I need is the URL. For the Tweets and Facebook group posts, I need an actual word documents with the Tweets and posts copied into it.
If you get behind on one of your tasks or decide you want to switch to another activity, that is fine. The flexibility of having the project submitted as a portfolio allows us this freedom.
More details on the requirements of each option are listed below. The Youtube video and website options are listed last, as they are the most detailed.

Option 1: Facebook group posts and comments
For this option you can start a Facebook group or join an existing group. Each week you will post or comment on a post at least five times. These posts and comments will need to be submitted in a word document at the end of the project. I suggest updating a word document every week.

Option 2: Twitter Feed
For this option you will need to have 10 tweets a week. Three of these can be retweets. You can always Tweet news stories or websites you like. There should be a hashtag related to your cause or created by you that you will use in your feed. Avoid plagiarism.

Option 3: Blog
For this option you will need to maintain a blog and post to it weekly. Blog posts need to be at least 200 words, proofread, and contain no plagiarism. You should also use tags or keywords in your posts so that you blog can be found through a Google search.

Option 4: Online petition
For this option you will need to create an online petition. You should have a strong written portion of 250-500 words.

Option 5: Three Memes
Your memes must not violate copyright laws or contain plagiarism. See examples of memes here: http://knowyourmeme.com. I suggest images with captions or parodies.
due dates: March 14^th, March 28^th, April 14^th

Option 6: Youtube video
Youtube due dates:
Storyboard: March 14^th
Email progress/youtube rough draft: March 28^th
Final video: April 14th
Your youtube video should make a compelling argument for your cause and/or solution. My suggested length is three minutes. However, we can negotiate this when you complete your rough draft. If you don't have a video editor you prefer to use, I suggest using wevideo.com, which is a cloud-based editor. I have a tutorial for the program here: http://youtu.be/35pnAQnMdgc.

Option 7: Website

·       Create a website using www.weebly.com, www.wix.com or site builder of your choice

·       Repurpose your 5-7 page Problem/Solution essay to fit the conventions of writing for the web (see online activism module under content)

·       Have at least four distinct pages

·       Choose or design a fitting template

·       Pick images that communicate your message (www.creativecommons.org, www.flickr.com, www.morguefile.com, or http://photobucket.com)

·       Avoid plagiarism or copyright issues

Examples from my Winter 2012 English 112 class:

http://poverty.natemealey.com/
http://childabuseprevented.weebly.com/
http://solvepoverty.weebly.com

Youtube, Your Voice

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            For a democracy to function…citizens must actively engage in public debate, applying reading and writing practices in the service of articulating their positions and their critiques of the positions of others. To have citizens who are unable to write and read for the public forum thus defeats the central purpose of the notion of democracy. (Berlin “Rhetorics” 109-10)

            Most of my assignments in this half of the semester have to do with changes to the public forum. To be civically empowered, students must be able to navigate and create in the interconnected multimedia environment of the web. Mashable declared 2012 to be the year of Youtube, where 7,000 hours of news-related video was uploaded daily. If students want a voice in today’s media landscape, they need to be able to do more than write a letter to the editor. They need to be able to articulate an argument in a multimodal fashion.

            My basic writing students are passionately committed to wanting to improve their city. Most believe the answer lies in targeting the youth – the youth who are discarding their education and pursuing a lifestyle fueled by drugs and money. Reaching today’s youth will not be achieved through letters to the editor. To reach the broader demographic needed to make change, our students need to go through the channels of social media and Youtube.

            After spring break, my English 090 students are going to create their first digital stories, a collection of personal testimonies regarding violence in Saginaw. They will be personal and driven by narrative elements, as this will anchor the unfamiliar video components in mode of storytelling they are comfortable with. Honestly, having done my first testimonial video on the topic of urban violence, I can say it is a more raw and powerful way to tell a story. Writing allows for a bit of distance, in fact distance is necessary to achieve perspective and reflection. However, the sound of your own voice reading the story and the images of real places and people removes the distance. The story becomes more immediate, the pathos stronger. Multimodal storytelling has more affective bandwidth – it’s able to convey more, faster.

While I’ve done a lot of video editing and remixes and mashups, this is my first personal digital story. Somehow that makes it seem less polished and more earnest. It makes me uncomfortable, and I take this to be a good sign: