Why Teach About Blogs and Blogging?

Originally published here on June 2, 2008.

(Reprinted from my personal blog...Nov. 26, 2007)

Blogging is a literary form. It has become very much a genre in its own right. It’s a growing genre, an influential genre, and it is a genre that we need to acquaint students with at an early age.

The word “blog” is a shortened for of the word weblog. The “we” gets amputated from the front of the word. That word formation process is just one example of the new level of creativity that online writing brings to our language.

Blogging has become for literature today something like what keeping a diary was in the 18th and 19th centuries. But not exactly. On the one hand, a blog can be private and personal. On the other hand, it can be designed to promote an opinion, a perspective, or to give advice – to the point of being commercial. It can be closed, accessible only to people you allow to see it. Or it can be very public, easily accessible.

Because blogs have become so numerous and influential, it’s important that students be aware of them and have some understanding of how to evaluate a blog. The skill of discerning fact from opinion is more important now than it has ever been. It’s important that students have some idea of how to find a blog if they want to look at one. Google, for example, has a special search engine that only searches websites it classifies as blogs. And, finally, it is important that students know how to create a blog for themselves if they want to – and that they understand the privacy issues and the liabilities that come with setting themselves up with a blog at a site like MySpace or FaceBook.

I personally think that digital self-expression is a wave of the future that could revive and regenerate the skill of composition in our language. Blogs have a profound impact on literacy in America and we need to be sure our kids are positively impacted by that…

I Think, Therefore I Blog…

Originally published here on March 23, 2008.

I think, therefore I blog...

I stumbled across that phrase a few years ago, surfing the Net. Regrettably, I didn't think to save the link. The author took a fairly academic tone (I think) that included references in APA format. Now though, you can find the expression on t-shirts as a manifestation of pop culture.

That first time I saw it, the author used the phrase to discuss the preoccupation our society has with introspection. Justly or unjustly, he blamed that preoccupation on Descartes. Descartes is generally considered the Father of Modern Philosophy, and most lay philosophers (like me) are familiar with his famous conclusion: I think, therefore I am.

Okay, the truth is I'm not that big on René Descartes (1596-1650). But I know a little about him...

The author of the piece that got me thinking about this topic years ago suggested that the entirety of European culture might be different if Descartes had said something else - something like, I think, and I think I'm bored, so I'll go read, and since I'm reading, I must exist. Or, maybe, something like I think, and what I think is that I need to go for a walk; and since I'm walking, I must exist. Or (of course), I think, and I think I'll go blog about what I think (and leave the idea of whether I exist at all to someone else).

I understood the author's point. But I'm not sure it holds up after a closer look at Descartes. I think Descartes' original statement was something more like "I doubt, therefore I'm think, and that must mean I exist." The Latin: Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum. That chain of thoughts would make Descartes' statement somewhat more active than the simple introspection that my forgotten author was bemoaning.

There is a distinction, I think, between introspection and reflection. Introspection becomes self absorbed; and while it might be personally gratifying, it can also be pointless. We become Narcissus, paralyzed by contemplating our own image. Reflection (in contrast to simple introspection) has purpose, and that purpose usually involves our impact on those we claim to serve in our profession...

I've seen the statement reversed a few times recently. I blog, therefore I am. I guess that's true of your existence in the blogosphere. But a large number of the software packages for blogging allow you to drip blog posts on at a future date. You could be dead for weeks (or even months), yet your blog would make people think you were still alive...

Many later philosophers have assumed that the only thing Descartes knew for sure (at least at that point) was that he existed. And I suppose that part of the foundation of Constructivism as an approach to ontology is the idea that thinking is central to existing. Somehow the rest of reality is there because we think about it.

I'll have to think about that...

I'll leave you with a quote from Isaac Asimov: Writing to me is simply thinking through my fingers.