the giant 'marketing' scenario behind tv programs like 'american idol'does seem irritating and shameful. corporations have successfully infiltrated into our entertainment, be reality shows or sports events, and we as audience sort of became subjects of their aggressive marketing experiments unconsciously or even voluntarily.
one of our classmates, 'davida', talked about an event at 'brooklyn academy of music'. when 'chase' was introduced as the program's sponsor, people started booing.
people (not all, though) hate corporations, more precisely, their ruthless quest for profit-making and their profit-before-people attitude. people get furious when corporations try to beautify themselves by sponsoring or donating for cultural and social events: the wolf in a lamb's skin.
as one of the anti-corporates, i myself often feel frustrated and confused. i say I hate them, but i can't deny that they are all around my life. in reality i'm a so-called 'valued customer' of many of them; bank account, credit cards, phone, cable service, mp3 (I have three!), a nice lcd television, my collection of running clothes, frequent trips to national chain stores instead of locally owned ones, just to name a few.
last year, i ran my first half marathon, a physically and mentally challenging, awakening, and meditative experience, and also an event sponsored by a corporation criticized for its global sweatshop abuses.... this is where I am... between the anti-corporate spirit and my real-life contradiction.
when i see super corporate people on tv, i immediately criticize them and call them 'satan's little helpers' as if my life has nothing to do with who they are and what they do.
but it turns out that i have so many friends who work in multinational corporations who tried so hard to get those jobs and work so hard for the organiztions they belong to. i don't think they are evil. they are all nice and hard-working people. (corporate people are evil and my corporate friends aren't? subjectivity!)
regardless of my conviction and consciousness toward how bad corporations are or can be, i can't really deny my life without them, and more accurately i feel quite helpless and self-contradictory.
despite all the ironies...
as a responsible individual, i'll not surrender to corporations, and I'll do my best to stay conscious and on top of their tactics and strategies. coincidentally, these days i'm 'seriously' considering running in one of the biggest races (by recognition) this year, also (happended to be) sponsored by another corporation that is claimed to have violated workers rights around the world.
i hate the sponsor abused workers, but the race will mean so much to me personally.
the race will mean so much to me personally, but i hate the sponsor abused workers.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Thursday, February 19, 2009
media literacy in school libraries
what is media literacy?
according to Center for Media Literacy (http://www.medialit.org/), the definition is
"Media Literacy is a 21st century approach to education. It provides a framework to access, analyze, evaluate and create messages in a variety of forms — from print to video to the Internet. Media literacy builds an understanding of the role of media in society as well as essential skills of inquiry and self-expression necessary for citizens of a democracy."
i think this is a brief but very comprehensive definition of what media literacy is, but the application and practice of it in libraries, especially in school environments doesn't seem as clear and simple as it is in the definition.
as there're variety of forms of media people use today, there're equally as diverse views and conflicts media literacy or media education. it sounds almost like a chaos. Despite all the debates regarding media literacy, I think there's one thing for sure: children and young adults are active users of media or technology, and adults (especially parents)do not really have control over it.
given this reality and the huge impact that media can have on teens, media literacy education is critical and urgent. it goes beyond enhancing self-expression or vocational skills. it is about educating them to be a critical and mature consumer of media, through which they can build life-long academic, intellectual, and vocational foundation.
I understand all the worries about violence, sex, drug, crime, etc. no society is free of them, as it's a part of human life. there is no way of completely staying away from them, even indirectly, unless one lives without any sort of medium.
think how awful it is that pornography is the first 'tool' that many kids learn about sex. and they will form a very abnormal concept of sex. and think how much information floating around the internet is actually junk. today's kids use it without the ability to evaluate it. adults, parents and educators alike, can't just sit back and criticize the harmful effect of media. what's harmful is inaction or inability to work on it, say, media literacy.
according to Center for Media Literacy (http://www.medialit.org/), the definition is
"Media Literacy is a 21st century approach to education. It provides a framework to access, analyze, evaluate and create messages in a variety of forms — from print to video to the Internet. Media literacy builds an understanding of the role of media in society as well as essential skills of inquiry and self-expression necessary for citizens of a democracy."
i think this is a brief but very comprehensive definition of what media literacy is, but the application and practice of it in libraries, especially in school environments doesn't seem as clear and simple as it is in the definition.
as there're variety of forms of media people use today, there're equally as diverse views and conflicts media literacy or media education. it sounds almost like a chaos. Despite all the debates regarding media literacy, I think there's one thing for sure: children and young adults are active users of media or technology, and adults (especially parents)do not really have control over it.
given this reality and the huge impact that media can have on teens, media literacy education is critical and urgent. it goes beyond enhancing self-expression or vocational skills. it is about educating them to be a critical and mature consumer of media, through which they can build life-long academic, intellectual, and vocational foundation.
I understand all the worries about violence, sex, drug, crime, etc. no society is free of them, as it's a part of human life. there is no way of completely staying away from them, even indirectly, unless one lives without any sort of medium.
think how awful it is that pornography is the first 'tool' that many kids learn about sex. and they will form a very abnormal concept of sex. and think how much information floating around the internet is actually junk. today's kids use it without the ability to evaluate it. adults, parents and educators alike, can't just sit back and criticize the harmful effect of media. what's harmful is inaction or inability to work on it, say, media literacy.
McLuhan and a grand central prank
after reading McLuhan's book, a past improv event came through my mind.
i think this prank flows well in many of McLuhan's words.
public freezing in the grand central .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6qWaJ-BG-k
"the public, in the sense of great consensus of separate and distinct viewpoints, is finished. today, the mass audience (the successor to the public) can be used as a creative, participating force." p.22
"ours is a brand-new world of alltonceness. time has ceased, space has vanished. we now live in a global village... a simultaneous happening. we are back in acoustic space. we have begun again to structure the primordial feeling, the tribal emotions from which a few centuries of literacy divorced us." p.63
"humor as a system of communication and as a probe of our environment-of what's really going on-affords us our most appealing anti-environmental tool. it does not deal in theory, but in immediate experience, and is often the best guide to changing perceptions. older societies thrived on purely literary plots. they demanded story lines. today's humor, on the contrary, has no story line- no sequence. it is usually a compressed overlay of stories." p. 92
"myth means putting on the audience, putting on one's environment. young people are looking for a formula for putting on the universe-participation mystique. they do not look for detached patterns- for ways of relating themselves to the world, a la nineteenth century." p.114
For those of who are interested in improv pranks like this, check out the following site. You can become an agent and participate! http://improveverywhere.com/
i think this prank flows well in many of McLuhan's words.
public freezing in the grand central .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6qWaJ-BG-k
"the public, in the sense of great consensus of separate and distinct viewpoints, is finished. today, the mass audience (the successor to the public) can be used as a creative, participating force." p.22
"ours is a brand-new world of alltonceness. time has ceased, space has vanished. we now live in a global village... a simultaneous happening. we are back in acoustic space. we have begun again to structure the primordial feeling, the tribal emotions from which a few centuries of literacy divorced us." p.63
"humor as a system of communication and as a probe of our environment-of what's really going on-affords us our most appealing anti-environmental tool. it does not deal in theory, but in immediate experience, and is often the best guide to changing perceptions. older societies thrived on purely literary plots. they demanded story lines. today's humor, on the contrary, has no story line- no sequence. it is usually a compressed overlay of stories." p. 92
"myth means putting on the audience, putting on one's environment. young people are looking for a formula for putting on the universe-participation mystique. they do not look for detached patterns- for ways of relating themselves to the world, a la nineteenth century." p.114
For those of who are interested in improv pranks like this, check out the following site. You can become an agent and participate! http://improveverywhere.com/
Saturday, February 14, 2009
typography vs. television
after reading Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death, i got to think a lot about television. our group (jennifer, andrea and Lori, Emily, Jennifer A.) also discussed the difference between television and internet. i think television used to be the most powerful and influential mass communication all over the world before the introduction of internet.
since 1997, the birth year of www, there has been an unprecedented change in the relationship between people and information or media. our dependence of television media has apparently decreased and we, as users, are in a much more powerful position to select and use a specific medium out of many that meets our individual needs. In a way, we're living in an age of media renaissance where media in diverse formats are created, adapted, and become part of our culture : typography, photo in print and digital, television, radio, cell phones, mp3, mp4.. film, video, internet.....
quite contrary to Neil Postman's concern, i think the culture of internet gave re-birth to a digital typography: through the internet, people express themselves more than ever before. blogging is a good example of it. whether it's used for a personal diary or practice of professional activism, political or social, blogging enabled people to express themselves more through writing. this is a true merit that 'digital typography' has over Postman's nostalgic age of typography.
when it comes to television, certain aspects or contributions it made cannot be overlooked. television enabled us to evolve from text-oriented culture to image, sound and motion-oriented one. it enabled us to see and experience, although indirectly, news, events and entertainments across the globe, or in a way made the world 'kind of' connected, although not in such an interactive and participatory way the internet does.
compared to the age of typography, i think the genuine power of television media lies in the visual effect. i don't agree with Postman in his claim that typography is the only 'mature' , 'sophisticated', and 'highly valuable' media. (he didn't exactly say this way, but this is my interpretation of it.) we, human beings, learn and process information not only by reason but also by senses, which means we can benefit from as many media as there can be. one can be more beneficial than the other, vice versa, depending on circumstances and intentions.
i grew up watching television a lot. i can't say that it was all that great. sometimes i feel i should have read more instead, but i can certainly say that i learned a lot from GOOD tv programs. (yes, there're plenty of good, and even educational ones!) some of my favorite channels like discovery, history, food network, travel, health and fit... are as valuable tools for learning to me as others in different formats. for me, they work as excellent stimulants for further study and research.
just as some dietitians say that 'we are what we eat', i think this logic can be applied to our relationship to media: given that we ourselves make conscious choice of media, we are what we see, we are what we listen to , we are what we say, we are what we write and we are what we use, in other words, whatever media we take, it represent who we are.
(any media can be a junk or treasure depending on how we consume it.)
since 1997, the birth year of www, there has been an unprecedented change in the relationship between people and information or media. our dependence of television media has apparently decreased and we, as users, are in a much more powerful position to select and use a specific medium out of many that meets our individual needs. In a way, we're living in an age of media renaissance where media in diverse formats are created, adapted, and become part of our culture : typography, photo in print and digital, television, radio, cell phones, mp3, mp4.. film, video, internet.....
quite contrary to Neil Postman's concern, i think the culture of internet gave re-birth to a digital typography: through the internet, people express themselves more than ever before. blogging is a good example of it. whether it's used for a personal diary or practice of professional activism, political or social, blogging enabled people to express themselves more through writing. this is a true merit that 'digital typography' has over Postman's nostalgic age of typography.
when it comes to television, certain aspects or contributions it made cannot be overlooked. television enabled us to evolve from text-oriented culture to image, sound and motion-oriented one. it enabled us to see and experience, although indirectly, news, events and entertainments across the globe, or in a way made the world 'kind of' connected, although not in such an interactive and participatory way the internet does.
compared to the age of typography, i think the genuine power of television media lies in the visual effect. i don't agree with Postman in his claim that typography is the only 'mature' , 'sophisticated', and 'highly valuable' media. (he didn't exactly say this way, but this is my interpretation of it.) we, human beings, learn and process information not only by reason but also by senses, which means we can benefit from as many media as there can be. one can be more beneficial than the other, vice versa, depending on circumstances and intentions.
i grew up watching television a lot. i can't say that it was all that great. sometimes i feel i should have read more instead, but i can certainly say that i learned a lot from GOOD tv programs. (yes, there're plenty of good, and even educational ones!) some of my favorite channels like discovery, history, food network, travel, health and fit... are as valuable tools for learning to me as others in different formats. for me, they work as excellent stimulants for further study and research.
just as some dietitians say that 'we are what we eat', i think this logic can be applied to our relationship to media: given that we ourselves make conscious choice of media, we are what we see, we are what we listen to , we are what we say, we are what we write and we are what we use, in other words, whatever media we take, it represent who we are.
(any media can be a junk or treasure depending on how we consume it.)
Saturday, January 31, 2009
welcome to my blog!
this blog is a crucial part of my graduate course 'instructional technology', and also a very necessary step in overcoming my laziness toward technology.
as i introduced myself to the class last week, i'm not a technology lover, but not necessarily a hater, either. i've been just extremely lazy and passive about all the technoloical development and changes for the past decade, which means a lot of stuff to catch up with.
thanks to the 'information technology' course that i took last semester, i've become somewhat confident in my ability and willingness to it, and i'd like to take this 680 course as a deepening phase for my love of technology.
despite my laziness, i've always been aware of the impact of technology on each and every one of us. this is more so for me as a library media specialist candadate. we, future information professionals, will interact much more with 'digital', or 'technology' saavy patrons and students and being able to guide and instruct them will be a big part of our profession.
while praising all the benefits that technology brought to our lives, i think it is equally important to consider related issues such as digital divide, and whether we're consumed by technology too much rather them consuming it for our sake....
as i introduced myself to the class last week, i'm not a technology lover, but not necessarily a hater, either. i've been just extremely lazy and passive about all the technoloical development and changes for the past decade, which means a lot of stuff to catch up with.
thanks to the 'information technology' course that i took last semester, i've become somewhat confident in my ability and willingness to it, and i'd like to take this 680 course as a deepening phase for my love of technology.
despite my laziness, i've always been aware of the impact of technology on each and every one of us. this is more so for me as a library media specialist candadate. we, future information professionals, will interact much more with 'digital', or 'technology' saavy patrons and students and being able to guide and instruct them will be a big part of our profession.
while praising all the benefits that technology brought to our lives, i think it is equally important to consider related issues such as digital divide, and whether we're consumed by technology too much rather them consuming it for our sake....
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