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Week 3: How do we fit in our networks? And how do our networks shape us?

Last night’s class was excellent—everyone had great comments to share about Catfish and our first set of readings, and I loved seeing your drawings of your individual memexes. (I’ll add a gallery of these pictures soon!) If there’s one thing we could do better, it would probably be to dig a little deeper into our readings. I was partly to blame for that last night, so next week you can expect me to push us back into the text whenever possible. As you read this week, try to highlight key passages you want to discuss and jot down notes for Wednesday’s class. I hope we can extend some of the ideas we touched on during Week 2, then get a little more specific about our day-to-day digital workflows.

To read before class:

  • The second major section of Networked, “How Networked Individualism Works.” In the print version, it’s pages 115–251. In the ebook, it’s Chapters 5–9, plus the second “Interlude.”
  • “Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age,” by George Siemens.

To do before class:

  • Explore a few Twitter lists (and pages linked to individual Twitter profiles) to find two people you would like to observe for the Online Identity Analysis project, then add those names to our collaborative spreadsheet in Google Drive called “Online Identity Analysis Subjects.”
  • Write a one-page proposal for your Online Identity Analysis project and add it to your Google Drive folder. (If you draft your proposal in MS Word or another program, be sure to convert the document to Google Docs format when you upload it.)
  • Write your first (or second) blog post, and if you haven’t done so already, email me the URL for your blog. If your blog covers non-class topics, too, create a category called “Digital Self” (or something like that) and send me the URL for your category page. I will aggregate all of your individual blogs into our “Motherblog” before next week’s class.

Bonus reading (as time and interest permit):

Based on our conversation in class last night, I thought it might be helpful to share a few Twitter-related resources. Even if you’ve been using Twitter for a long time, you might find something useful in a couple of these articles:

Last but not least, if you would like to discuss your proposal for Online Identity Analysis assignment, please come see me during office hours (T 1-4 and W 9-12 in Shanks 427) or drop me a line via email.