Henry Jenkins: ‘From YouTube to YouNiversity’
20 02 2007In exploring the role of participatory media forms in higher eduction, media scholar Henry Jenkins recently penned an article entitled “From YouTube to YouNiversity” for the Chronicle of Higher Education. It’s a great read, but this passage particularly caught my attention:
Blogs represent a powerful tool for engaging in these larger public conversations. At my university, we noticed that a growing number of students were developing blogs focused on their thesis research. Many of them were making valuable professional contacts; some had developed real visibility while working on their master’s degrees; and a few received high-level job offers based on the professional connections they made on their blogs. Blogging has also deepened their research, providing feedback on their arguments, connecting them to previously unknown authorities, and pushing them forward in ways that no thesis committee could match. Now all of our research teams are blogging not only about their own work but also about key developments in their fields. We have redesigned the program’s home page, allowing feeds from these blogs to regularly update our content and capture more of the continuing conversations in and around our program. We have also started offering regular podcasts of our departmental colloquia and are experimenting with various forms of remote access to our conferences and other events.
Henry teaches at MIT, leading the Comparative Media Studies Programme, which is globally respected and watched as a high-powered hub of ideas and pratices regarding emerging (or emergent) digital media and the interactions facilitated by those media. His words about the importance of blogging for graduate students resonnate widely, suggesting that blogging and social software are here to stay in higher education and are especially important for postgraduate research students.
As the the article may disappear behind the Chronicle’s paid firewall at some point, Henry has re-posted the article in his own blog here. Go and have a read …
[...] From YouTube to YouNiversity In exploring the role of participatory media forms in higher eduction, media scholar Henry Jenkins recently penned an article entitled “From YouTube to YouNiversity” for the Chronicle of Higher Education. It’s a great read, but this passage particularly caught my attention: Blogs represent a powerful tool for engaging in these larger public conversations. At my university, we noticed that a growing number of students were developing blogs focused on their thesis research. Many of them were making valuable professional contacts; some had developed real visibility while working on their master’s degrees; and a few received high-level job offers based on the professional connections they made on their blogs. Blogging has also deepened their research, providing feedback on their arguments, connecting them to previously unknown authorities, and pushing them forward in ways that no thesis committee could match. Now all of our research teams are blogging not only about their own work but also about key developments in their fields. We have redesigned the program’s home page, allowing feeds from these blogs to regularly update our content and capture more of the continuing conversations in and around our program. We have also started offering regular podcasts of our departmental colloquia and are experimenting with various forms of remote access to our conferences and other events. Henry teaches at MIT, leading the Comparative Media Studies Programme, which is globally respected and watched as a high-powered hub of ideas and pratices regarding emerging (or emergent) digital media and the interactions facilitated by those media. His words about the importance of blogging for graduate students resonnate widely, suggesting that blogging and social software are here to stay in higher education and are especially important for postgraduate research students. As the the article may disappear behind the Chronicle’s paid firewall at some point, Henry has re-posted the article in his own blog here. Go and have a read …[Cross-posted from Tama's eLearning Blog] Posted: Tuesday, February 20, 2007 3:49 PM by Tama Filed under: blogs, blogosphere, academia, student engagement, web2.0, participatoryculture [...]
Hi Tama
I am pleased to have just discovered your edublog and looking forward to reading your spin on things from that side of the world.
Best wishes
[...] Jenkin’s Youniversity Jump to Comments Tama’s eLearning blog just pointed to an incredible article by Henry Jenkins titled fromYoutube to YouNiversity. An absolute must read for anyone engaged in media, information, communications, education, sociology, … its a reasonably short and accessible read, but one that I think is so good I hardly know what to do with it! [...]