If Convergence Culture is the Future….
Reading Jenkins’ 2004 “Why Heather Can’t Read” first, I have strong opinions about the themes of this week’s readings. In short, conflict exists over the notion that homeschooled students spend time critically analyzing and rewriting fiction, such as the works of Harry Potter. On one hand, Education Professors, such as University of Wisconsin-Madison Professor James Gee marvel at students’ ability to become more active, engage, analyze, and publish at such a young age.
However, Literary “purist” question those students’ ability to develop into creative writers at such a young age. The opposing argument that I gather from the text is that these students are likely not reading and writing at the level that they would if they were in traditional school setting studying classing works and being taught by teachers.
As someone who has taught extremely gifted students whose writing abilities exceeded most of my undergraduate students, I can attest that there are students whose intelligence intimidates the average teacher or professor. They benefit from independent student and they should have the option or freedom to expand their writing craft with literature that’s interesting.
This is not a question of whether Heather “can” or “cannot ” read. The question is why try to measure Heather’s ability to read based on her desire to read what “society” or traditional public school dictates she should read?
Regarding Democratizing TV and Reader-Moderating News Content, I saw this as very similar to the previous argument.
If reader moderated content was created to foster unity, empathy, and civil discourse, I think that students like Heather Lawver are ahead of the curve.
I am not so sure this social media and attention seeking society is responsible enough to rewrite core stories unless those core stories are for fictional and entertainment purposes.
Jenkins, Henry. 2006. Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. New York
University Press. (PDF)
Read the Introduction, Chapter 5, and Conclusion (A version of Chapter 5 is also
available
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/402471/why-heather-can-write/
it seems this post could use some quick edits to tidy up references (in text and at the end).
you bring in some good observations about how we judge (whether fairly or not, effectively or not) students’ (or any other young person’s) abilities to communicate effectively. I’m reminded of a linguistic blog I follow where the blogger often reposts or comments on the uniqueness of internet language use. just because that usage is not “standard” doesn’t mean it isn’t complex or demanding in its own ways. language use and grammar norms are evolving in complex ways, and often young people play a huge role in that. here’s one example I bookmarked a few weeks back: https://allthingslinguistic.com/post/182044214117/do-you-know-how-to-capitalize